


Lost Years Gone

by Nouna



Series: How to be [5]
Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Abusive Parents, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Christmas Special, Drunk Driving, Elijah Kamski & Gavin Reed are Siblings, Family Bonding, Family Drama, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Past Drug Addiction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-24
Updated: 2019-12-24
Packaged: 2021-02-25 23:35:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 28,895
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21913768
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nouna/pseuds/Nouna
Summary: Gavin got himself an invitation for Christmas and has no idea what to expect.He might be a little bit panicked right now, but what 'do' you even wear to a billionaire's Christmas party?Assumed the invitation hadn't been just a joke?And of capital importance: What should he do with his cat?
Relationships: Elijah Kamski & Gavin Reed, Gavin Reed & Gavin Reed's Mother, Hank Anderson/Connor, Original Chloe | RT600/Elijah Kamski, Upgraded Connor | RK900/Gavin Reed
Series: How to be [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1127831
Comments: 12
Kudos: 71





	Lost Years Gone

**Author's Note:**

> This is a little fling about a happy (Elijah Kamski) and not so happy (mommy Kamski) Family reunion. The latter is more of an excuse to invite Gavin's support cast into the story.   
> All around happy holidays and a brilliant start into 2020. We all gonna die! :DDD

It was the night before Christmas eve when Gavin laid awake in his bed and stared at his cracked phone display with a gnawing feeling of unease under his ashen skin. In slow little motions, his thumb followed the spider web structure in the broken glass as he got lost in the deep end of his thoughts. Nervousness tingled through every muscle as he read Fake-Andersons two messages over and over again.

In the last weeks, Gavin had had an exceptional amount of time to mull over all the stuff that had gotten him exactly where he was right now in his life. After his run-in with an _old associate_ , it had taken him weeks to recover and get up on his own two feet again. Gavin's knees still shook if he moved too much around and to this day he hadn't gained all of the lost weight and muscle mass back, so his clothes looked baggy on his haggard frame. Nines did his usual perfect best to not make it obvious, but as soon as he was around he guarded Gavin like a watchdog.

Even though it made Gavin cranky and loud, he couldn't even hold it against him. Gavin still looked kind of like a starved dog. But Nines fussing made him feel even more anxious as well as strangely frail.

Gavin folded an arm under his head and stared at the dark shadows that danced over the ceiling as a car drove by while he tried to remember the cellar of Charleston House. He wasn't even sure he could remember the face of the guy who got him into this ugly mess. Even though Gavin was sure he remembered the read-heads face from his old messed up days, he couldn't for his life put a name to it. Nines hadn't talked about it. If there was a name in the criminal database matching that face, he hadn't told Gavin. Most likely to go easy on him as long as he still was in his recovery period.

That guy's venomous words followed Gavin now often enough into his dream-space. He had said Norris was dead...

Gavin hadn't had the opportunity to check the databases for himself. If there was a case somewhere with Norris' name on it, once more, Nines hadn't told him.

Gavin shuddered and tried repeatedly to remind himself that he was neither from Narcotics nor from Vice. He didn't invest time in having an eye on the junkies because it wasn't his god damn job. Something vicious and ugly inside of him clawed already for weeks away at his sanity because these guys still had been 'his people'. He had been one of them, once. He should care, it should matter to him, why didn't he feel anything when he thought about all of those who had died?!

But now he noticed it wasn't quite true, was it. Gavin felt a lot of things in regards to his past. So many things in fact, that he couldn't decide on a final reaction to it all. Even though he knew for a fact that Red Ice had ruined most of his life, the people he had met in its circles had been more of a family than the one he had been born into.

Even though, now that he actually thought about it, Joel had been a damn whole lot like his dad. From passive-aggressive to aggressive-aggressive, there had been the same stages of control and intimidation, pain and abuse. Gavin's eyes widened as he realized he could confidently add 'daddy issues' on top of his already miles-long list of faults.

But then... under Joel's wing, he also had met Romanov. Maybe a little delicate, but furiously angry she had been so lovely to all the people she had considered 'her own'.  
Gavin thought about her for the first time in ages. Was she dead, too? Killed by her own demons, her peers - or maybe even law enforcement?

Gavin loathed the thought of that. It made him shudder in revulsion. One of the few actually good people he had known at the time could be laying dead in a ditch somewhere because nobody really cared about the junkies. Not even guys like Gavin.

Gavin's expression pulled into a tight, venomous snarl as he stared down Fake-Andersons messages. The only good thing about his past as a Red Ice addict was the distance he felt to his very own emotions.  
That miserable lowlife couldn't scare Gavin into submission, because it just wasn't possible to daunt a hollow one.

Gavin was seldom afraid of anything that was able to kill him. He was more likely to retaliate to open hostility with petty and violent arsehole behavior. And of course with a damn whole lot of derisive taunts.  
That's why his thumb finally danced over the broken display to create only one single answering message.

> **\- Honeybadger -** I lived, Bitch ♡

It was childish and petty and made Gavin instantly feel 'so much' better.

* * *

Gavin felt anxiety hum away under his skin as he stepped on tiptoes over the threshold of his own bedroom. Even in his own home, he felt twitchy while his endlessly humming nerves created an always present stage of paranoia. He was at all times hyper-aware of his own movements, of the noises he made or of the space around him he couldn't overview in a single gaze. Even nothing but dark corners in his own apartment felt suddenly threatening.

All of his muscles seemed to quiver with nervous energy and made it impossible for him to relax. He felt antsy, couldn't sleep and only felt calm enough to rest when he pulled his favorite hoodie over his head and used it to narrow down his field of vision. Almost as if he was suddenly a skittish horse in dire need of blinkers. It was a highly irritating state of being.

Gavin didn't turn on the lights as he crept on tiptoes through his own apartment, because to expose himself in the middle of the night to the things that might lurk in the dark corners of his own place didn't feel 'safe'.

Slowly he pushed himself along the wall of the corridor until he finally reached his living room. First, he searched for was Nines until he remembered he had kicked him out to Connor and Anderson. Holidays and all. Nines needed a brother. A reliable family. Gavin had his own to deal with in just some fleeting hours.

After so much lost time it only could end up awkward as fuck. Maybe Gavin would ruin it all with his stale old anger because he just couldn't handle the situation as a real grown-up should. Chloe was already there. He didn't need another witness with an unfailing memory.

The Countess sat on the kitchen table. Seated on her hind legs she stretched up to stare at something outside the big living room windows. Gavin followed her line of sight and still had no idea what her deal was. With a final look at her, he snorted a low laugh before he grabbed for the cigarettes on the counter by the door and went for the balcony with a quilt tucked under his arm.

He took the ashtray that always rested on the windowsill and sat down against the black railing. He needed the rush of hot smoke in his lungs because only that finally stopped his hands from shaking. Gavin closed his eyes as he tipped his head back and simply took a little rest. The morning wasn't about to break until almost nine o'clock. That made almost four hours of winter morning he still had completely for himself.

As he sat there in the dark under a cloud-covered sky, Gavin felt like he never had quite appreciated the little things in life. Things like the next sunrise or the sight of early sunlight reflected on a sheet of snow.

Gavin already could hear the city working. Dozens of cars went by and his neighbors woke and went to work while some complained under their breath about their frozen car windows. It was the busy sound Gavin was intimately familiar with. Peaceful silence just didn't suit him.

It smelled of cold weather, rain and now also of cigarettes. The fading clouds of smoke swirled over the balcony until the railing cut them through. As Gavin lowered his eyes again, the Countess sat right in front of him.

With a curious stare, she tilted her rosy little head and followed the glimmering tip of Gavin's cigarette in the dark with wide-open eyes. "What's it?", mumbled Gavin around the cigarette between his teeth before he took another deep drag. His chest burned in a traitorous reaction to the intrusion of hot smoke and tar. It was the first time he took a smoke in weeks. "You'll snitch to Nines, won't you?"

The Countess took a well-calculated leap and settled down perfectly balanced on top of his right knee. Her eyes narrowed down in obnoxious judgment. Gavin loved her to pieces. "You can't go on stabbing me in the back like this!", he whined. "I'm the one who feeds-... uh... well. I'm the one who 'houses' you. You should always take my side."

The CA-T007 stared so utterly unimpressed at him, her sharp gaze was actually quite hard to bear. Finally, she answered with an awed little snarl and batted the cigarette right from Gavin's lips. It tumbled down his shoulder, slipped underneath the railing and fell right over the edge of the balcony where it vanished out of sight. While Gavin speechlessly stared at her, the Countess lifted her paw and licked it clean from traces of cigarette ash. Gavin sniffed. "You are insufferable."

The Countess only answered with a silent 'Meh' and then turned to look down between the balcony railing. Gavin observed her silently, watched as she stretched to get a better look around. A breeze of icy wind made Gavin shiver and ask himself if she could feel it, too. Suddenly she looked at him and made a silent noise. Her LED danced in an excited yellow circle. Not even a second later Gavin's phone buzzed inside his pocket.

"Nah, what's it, darling?", he asked in surprise while he fumbled it out. The Countess still didn't talk to him in a civilized manner, but her chat-log was filled to the brim with cute but annoying little smiley faces and a library worth of utmost ridiculous reaction gifs. Sometimes she even cobbled stuff up in a way that resembled an old fashioned no context meme. Abstract mash-ups that could easily count as a form of modern hieroglyphs. Quite fitting for a tiny sphinx, if you asked Gavin.

But sometimes she simply used her connection to his phone to show Gavin things.

Sometimes she linked him articles about Android-Pet care since all three to four weeks he seemed to get himself into a frenzy of panicked 'I have no idea what I'm doing?!'s. More often she forwarded him cute cat videos, memes and sometimes even little clips of her day.

This time she showed him a gif of a big black bird that dangled quite happily from a clothesline rope. Gavin instantly recognized the angle and the window behind it, so he turned around and was just fast enough to see the fat crow take flight and shoot into the sky with an eery loud caw.

Gavin tracked it with his eyes until the bird was out of sight. As he then lowered his gaze back to the Countess, she was still staring right at him. Gavin blinked in thought. "You haven't ever been outside, huh?"

The Countess shook her head and her fluttering ears made a funny noise. Gavin chuckled lowly and lifted a hand to caress her tiny head. She snuggled so strongly into his palm that she almost lost her balance on his knee. "What would you think about a little stroll? Just you an me an some snow? Not even the 'Escalating Retro-Bot' around, this time", Gavin murmured and watched with a stubborn smile on his face as her big grey eyes went wide. Her excitement was easy to read since her LED flared up in bright yellow bursts. Clumsily she stretched and batted for his nose and cheek.

Gavin couldn't help but laugh as she jumped right into his arms. In a simple reflex, he caught and hugged her close to his chest while the Countess peppered little kitten kisses all over his face.

"You should have told me how bored you are, you menace!", he said before he lifted himself up with a low grown. He was still rather stiff and sore and moving around was just no fun. But, he guessed, he was at least in good company. That alone would take him a long way.

Back inside he sat the Countess down on her favorite couch cushion before he went to retrieve some warmer clothes under his hoody. When he finally stood by his door and gathered his wallet and keys, he noticed a jacket hanging by the door, right under his own leather one. It couldn't be his. It was 'white'.

Gavin wrinkled his nose and pulled it down before he even knew what he was doing. Nines' black and white dress jacket was strangely heavy in his hands. Gavin couldn't even say out of which materials it was made of. The blue reflectors with their holographic cyberlife advertisement looked alien in a world where nobody wore them anymore. Nines must have left it in Gavin's car the day they had gone for Charleston House...

Gavin got distracted long enough to jump almost guiltily as the Countess let out a long loud whine at his feet. "Yes, yes, yes, don't get mean", he grumbled and threw the uniform over his shoulders before he could think up a reason why he shouldn't. He could be self-indulgent once in a while. It was early enough for him to not meet anyone who would ask stupid questions anyway.

"Come here, up!", he said as he gathered the Countess up and lifted her gently onto his shoulders. As if by design her lean little body slid right into Gavins hood while she held onto his right shoulder and stared wide-eyed ahead. Her head turned in every direction while her artificial muscles felt tight like a spring. Gavin lifted a hand and pressed her tiny head in a gesture of comfort against his cheek.

"Don't be scared, darling. I am right here. Just stay with me", he murmured lowly and pressed a little kiss to her cheek, ignoring her complaining mewl, before he opened the final door and stepped outside into the snow.

Instantly the Countess leaned upon his shoulder and stretched for falling white flakes while Gavin felt her excited purr rumble all over his neck. A sharp gust of wind made Gavin flinch and close his eyes. As he stuffed both of his hands into the jacket pockets he was surprised to find they weren't empty.

Nines had kept his knife.

Slowly Gavin pulled the closed butterfly knife out to examine it and turned it between his fingers. He flipped it open with a practiced swing. The shiv was chipped and the tip was broken off, so the balance wasn't exactly as he remembered it, but... Gavin was kind of glad it was still there. It had been a solid weight in his hands for over twenty years now. With a flick, he snapped it closed and stuffed it back into Nines' pocket.

Then he decided for a stroll to the little park some blocks down the road. More a small open garden than a park, really.

He sat down on a bench as the morning was still dark and gloomy. Sadly the sky was not clear enough to watch for stars. The sky wouldn't brighten up until at least two more hours went by.

"Okay", Gavin murmured against the Countess' long neck. "Take a look around, whatever. I stay right here. But don't go too far, okay? The world isn't overtly friendly to tiny people like you."

The Countess gave him a deeply annoyed look which made Gavin snigger before she hopped down into his lap. Warily she leaned over to stare with big bright eyes at the snow between Gavin's feet. Multiple times it felt like she was about to jump - but every time she decided otherwise. One tiny paw stretched down but wasn't long enough to reach.

Gavin was so close to being an utter dick and just giving her a little shove, but then decided to reach down instead. His fingers curled around a clumb of ice and lifted it to her inspection. The tiny Androids LED spun in excited brilliant blue and yellow bursts as she sniffed and watched the ice slowly melt away between Gavin's fingers.

She even lifted a paw into his palm - and promptly shook it almost violently as she felt that it was cold and wet. Gavin chuckled lowly. "Come on, Princess. It won't hurt you. I promise", he murmured to gently encourage her.

It needed some more minutes of soft coaxing, but finally, she took the leap of faith. And as soon as all her four feet landed in the snow she made a loud noise and jumped higher than Gavin had ever seen her. He laughed until tears stung in the corners of his eyes, even though the Countess gave him her best intimidating glare over her petit little shoulders.

Then she went strolling, while her eyes gleamed like little reflectors in the dark. Gavin heard her sneak around and watched with interest as she discovered the roots of trees and crawled through wet piles of leaves and withered bushes.

He sat for a long time on that bench. Far longer than he had anticipated as he suggested their little adventure. Idle Gavin played some games on his phone or watched the people who made their rounds as the sun finally went up. His fingers felt restless as he put his phone away and he didn't want to smoke, so he took out the knife instead. The repeating, familiar motions of his fingers felt soothing. He needed some tries until he found a way to work around the shifted balance point, but as he got it, it started to feel easy again. So god damn easy. He flicked the blade between his fingers left and right and felt the weight and every little motion. A tiny spec of complete control in his hands.

"Woah, that looks freaking awesome! Hey. You out here alone?"

Gavin flinched and snapped the shiv shut in a sure grip before he turned around. Some guy had sat down on the bench beside him. Gavin hadn't even noticed. It was a young man maybe in his mid-twenties or so. His dark hair was hidden under a thick woolen beanie. Gavin 'scanned' him for a first impression and took him for a nervous and quite awkward fellow. "... Yes", he answered lowly with a frown.

The guy leaned back, crossed his arms in front of his chest and tapped his foot. A man who desperately tried to look casual. "What model are you?", he asked, but stuttered just a blink later, still not looking into Gavin's face. Instead, he stared at the snapped shut knife in his hand. "Uh, y'know, don't wanna be rude or anything, it's just your face is kinda rare, I guess."

Gavin blinked and suddenly felt like he caught a fish without even throwing out a net. Without looking away from the guy's haggard face he lifted his hand and tipped with his left index finger onto the sewn-in insignia on his right shoulder. "... RK900."

Slowly he tilted his head. His frown went even deeper. "You have a good eye. Showcase model, won't see my face around much."

Was this just a horrible attempt at flirting ...? Gavin wasn't sure, but these nervous jitters in the guy's muscles reminded Gavin way too strongly of his own. He felt his suspicion was confirmed as the guy basically threw himself around with a wide and slightly twitchy grin. "Showcase! Not produced for the public at all?"

Of course, Gavin knew a hell of a lot of Androids went without their LED these days. Additionally, it could be quite challenging to differentiate between human and android if you just assumed the person you were talking to was a custom model or something like that with their typically unique features - should you decide against randomly touching them like an utter garbage person, since the texture of their skin would instantly tell you the truth. But 'this' guy had to be a complete and utter moron if he believed for even one second that-...

Gavin's brain suddenly stuttered to a halt.

Wait.

With a frown, his gaze followed down his own arm to his hand that still squeezed tightly around his pocket knife. Frozen he regarded the back of his hand. All the little scars and delicate tendons, pulled taut underneath a protective layer of flesh and skin. The wrinkles over his knuckles.

Then he remembered Nines' warming touch.

Both of Nines' hands were covered in little nicks and scars, just like Gavins, from all those times when his plastic shell had been scraped or cut or scratched. The layer of artificially projected skin glossed over all those little marks and imperfections but wasn't able to hide them away. They looked just like the ones on Gavin's hands.

Gavin swallowed. The creases between his brows smoothed out as he felt the weight of some strange kind of epiphany sink down on his shoulders. Slowly he sat upright. His mouth opened while he still blinked the mirages of his racing thoughts away. "No", he finally answered and shook his head. "I was-... they made me for Cyberlifes security sector. The program was scrapped at the time of the revolution."

The guys gleaming eyes widened as he pulled his balled fists up to his chest in a cheer. "Cyberlife Security?! That's absolutely fucking rad, man!"

Gavin had almost expected another attack by some broken kid like the ones who had gotten Anderson and Connor. But this guy looked just so genuinely excited. Gavin narrowed his eyes and gave his best to try and understand what was even happening.

He twitched as the young man tipped his elbow into his side. "Hey, you interested in a job?"

...

Gavin had absolutely no fucking idea what his face was doing right now. But whatever it did, it made the guy lift his hands in a defensive gesture and stutter quickly under his breath. "Nothing that gets you into any kind of trouble, pal, I swear. Just... some errands I guess, nothing bad."

Gavin couldn't help the unconvinced snort that forced itself out of his chest. "Complete and utterly legal errands, I guess?"

The guy blinked before he shrugged and scratched over the scruff of his cheek. "Nah, nothing 'illegal' at all."

The 'for you' was so heavily implied, it was impossible not to get the message. Gavin stifled a low groan as he got reminded that so many, even violent, crimes were as of yet completely legal for Androids - just because armies of lawyers had a too big stick up their arse to accept Androids as complete equals to humans.

Instead of a general blanket treatment, which would have guaranteed that dangerous Androids could be sentenced the same way as humans, the jurisdiction wanted to discuss and decide on a case by case basis and set precedences while they slowly worked themselves through all the rights of U.S. citizenship.

It wasn't because they deemed Androids as less capable of being a danger to the public. If anything, Androids got judged more harshly for the pettiest bullshit, even though the Jericho Organisation was working their processors ragged to fight unjust court rulings left and right.

No, it was just a side effect of their attempts to 'filter' which basic rights the government needed to provide for both Androids and Humans. Why give an Android a basic right to food, water, and a home if they technically didn't need any of those things?

Agitated Gavin rubbed both of his hands roughly over his face and swallowed an internal scream before he let himself fall into the backrest. He blinked and took some deep and hopefully calming breaths. "You know what?!", he finally decided. "Why the fuck not."

With a low rumble in his chest, he turned around to the guy. "How much's in for me then?"

The young man shrugged completely unconcerned and now that Gavin watched for the signs, he was pretty sure the guy was also not far away from his last high. "Fifty bucks per run, two times a week", he said as his eyes followed a jogging blonde in a tight pink overall. "We are starting slow."

Gavin's nose twitched into a toothless snarl, while he shook his head in silent amusement. "A start-up, huh?"

He wondered what this guy was up to. At least he hadn't the typical stench of a man who spends most of his time around a chemistry set. Maybe something more retro like opium. Or bioengineered weed. "Okay. How do I find you?"

Gavin almost laughed out loud as the guy turned his head and looked suspiciously inconspicuous up and down the walkway while he pulled something out of his pocket - and actually gave Gavin a piece of god damn paper. A piece of paper with an address on it, honest to the gods. No one would ever believe him.

"When do you expect me to show up?"

The guy answered with a wide grin and a nervous sniff. "Next Wednesday should be fine. Just around noon or something. Hey, bring beer?"

Yeah. Again, why the fuck not. Gavin watched him push his hands back into his pockets and take his leave. Gavin had no idea what the hell had just happened. But at least he got himself a date this week. It sounded like fun, too.

The Countess was suddenly back and, after an elegant leap, settled down in Gavin's lap. Equally bewildered her wide-eyed stare followed the young man while she leaned upon Gavin's shoulder to watch his movement through the park until he went around the next corner. Her blackened feet left tiny muddy paw prints on Nines' jacket. "Did you take some photos?", Gavin asked distractedly. The Countess answered with a low and assuring noise. Gavin smiled a crooked smile and gently pressed a kiss to her cheek. "Good girl."

As soon as Gavin stood up the Countess took back her place inside the hood in his nape. Gavin's thumb brushed over the display of his phone as he distractedly started to send a new message.

> **\- Reed -** Hey, Retro-Bot. The Countess made some photos just now. Give me a check-up through your database, will you?

But just as his thumb pressed down on send, he remembered. His face flushed as he gave his best to quickly row backward.

> **\- Reed -** No

> **\- Reed -** Whatever
> 
> **\- Reed -** Forget it, never mind. It's Christmas

But he hadn't even awkwardly fumbled his phone back into his pocket as it already vibrated in answer. A very extensive text came in.

> **\- # 313 248 317 - 43 -** Leo Manfred // 23 years of age // domiciled in 76 Guinvale --- minor drug offence // trespassing // defamation // posession --- responding Officer 'Police Officer Ryan Thinley' --- charges dropped in curt --- a mild cat allergy // once in ER for excessive self-harm behavior --- Classified as non violent --- AI_A rating '43.76' marked under 'low priority'.

Gavin blinked and felt somehow frozen as well as completely dumbfounded. It still took him by surprise how eerily fast Nines could pull basically anyone's information out of his head. Another message came in as soon as Gavin was done skipping through the first one.

> **\- # 313 248 317 - 43 -** What for? You are not supposed to be working, Detective.

Gavin's eyes promptly narrowed while he rolled his tongue through his mouth in a failing attempt to get rid of this suddenly flaring hot and sour taste. Slowly he shook his head and wrinkled his nose in a toothless snarl as his thumb already flinched over the screen to send an answer.

> **\- Reed -** I'm a grownup, Dork-Bot and contrary to you I even have the proper documentation to prove it

But right as he sent it, his thumb froze on the screen and he took a deep stuttering breath before the prickling heat in his cheeks made him bite down even harder.

> **\- Reed -** Anyway, never the fuck ever tell me anything about my AI rating

Gavin felt kind of caught on the wrong foot. It was so wrong for him to not be active. For him to be told he shouldn't do anything. It was almost a physical itch at the base of his skull and he hated to be so close under Nines observation, even though he usually didn't mind at all.

Gavin closed his eyes and counted to ten.

> **\- Reed -** Don't fuss so god damn much, jeeez. I'm not working. At least I don't think I am. Got myself a date at Wednesday Noon, though

It was kind of funny how this time Nines reply needed at least three times longer to appear in his inbox.

> **\- # 313 248 317 - 43 -** A date

Gavin fell victim to an ugly snort. He had no idea what tone of voice he should associate with that message and it felt like the best joke he had heard in forever.

> **\- Reed -** You may pick me up at ten. You may also want to prepare for an adventure

Gavin rasped a laugh at the following silence and promptly stubbed his toe at an uneven paving stone. The Countess made a little noise as he stumbled and went on to grouse her discontent right into his ear.

As Nines' message pinged in this time, the settings of Gavin's vibration alert seemed to have magically set itself to the maximum.

> **\- # 313 248 317 - 43 -** Don't laugh at me, Meatbag. I will be there by nine.

Wow, how mean. Gavin chuckled some more and reached up to give that little spying network node on his shoulder a good scratch behind its big artificial ears.

They 'were' going on an adventure this Wednesday. Just the two of them and some wasted pals. Gavin's laugh rumbled rough and deep enough through his chest to hurt. All the while the Countess stood high and tall on his shaking shoulders and judged every pedestrian with a glare who dared to give Gavin even just one strange look.

* * *

No bell rung as he pushed open the door of that tiny convenience store down the road where Gavin used to get most of his groceries from. 

The Android behind the counter, a young-looking woman with fiery orange hair, dozens of ear piercings and brightly colored tattoos up her left arm, made a double-take and almost threw aside her magazine as she got aware of him. For a blink, her LED flashed brightly yellow.

"Good day, Mr. Reed!", she greeted him with a wide smile and startled him into a little jump. Irritated he pulled a grimace. He couldn't remember to ever have spoken to her. Still, her smile didn't lose even a bit of its radiance as she leaned up on the counter. "Didn't see you in a while, your -..."

Her eyes made a little flick. There were some typical signs which made it now exceptionally easy for Gavin to detect when Androids scanned him. Even when they tried to be subtle about it - no one was as subtle as Nines. 

"...- your, uh, partner said you got really sick. Are you alright again?", she asked and sounded so genuinely perturbed. Gavin felt a bit out of it. He didn't even know her name. "I- uh..."

"Oh, you have a cat?"

The Countess leaned up on Gavin's shoulder and cuddled her tiny head against his left cheek. 'Meh', she answered and eyed the shop clerk with open curiosity. The woman lifted both of her hands to her own cheeks and positively cooed. "Aaaw!"

Gavin blinked with a slightly open mouth and changed a look between the Countess and her. "Actually...", he muttered lowly and interrupted himself for a moment to clear his throat. "Uh... could you maybe entertain her for me? Just for some minutes? I, uh, just go and get my usual stuff."

The Countess turned around to him with a wide-eyed stare of badly concealed panic. Meanwhile, the store clerk squeed happily. "Sure I can, Mr. Reed, with pleasure!"

Gavin chuckled lowly. The Countess gave him a betrayed look as he sat her down on the counter, even as he pressed a little kiss to her head. "I won't be long", he murmured. At least one of the Androids looked absolutely delighted. 

He took a shopping bag from under the counter and left the Countess with a short nod in the shop clerk's care before he turned to search around the isles. Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw her lift a finger and boop the Countess' tiny nose. The cat flinched back with a movement of her big ears but kept on to stand tall against this scary strange new person. Gavin didn't know he was smiling until he caught his own reflection in a glass panel. 

With a shake of his head, he went on his usual route through the corner store and picked up anything that looked like it had the potential to make him feel a little bit more like a human being: strong coffee, bars of chocolate, some cans of his favorite energy drink - all the stuff that used to make the lazy bubbling feel-good-chemicals inside his bloodstream sing in delight. 

He also stopped at the alcohol aisle. Gavin already knew it definitely wasn't a good idea. But the thought of sitting completely sober through a family reunion didn't sound compelling to him at all. He took a bottle of black lamb whiskey and let it be. He could disguise it as a hospitality gift - even though anyone would know instantly for whom it really was. 

Gavin huffed as the thought arose that Elijah most likely drank stuff that was more expensive than Gavin's whole apartment.

... what the hell was he even doing...?

On his way back to the counter Gavin made a double-take at a shelf that sure as shit hadn't been there the last time he had been shopping at this place. 

Located between motor oil and different types of cleaning agents, which struck Gavin as a little bit offensive, to be honest, the owners had stocked a sparkling blue shelf with lots of blueblood packages and a damn whole lot of other kinds of Android products. 

Especially interesting was the yellow line taped around it on the floor which marked it as 'health hazard'. Someone had even hung up a printed sign that read '!!! CAUTION !!! - If You Are Human, Consumption WILL KILL YOU!'.

Huh. Gavin felt instantly intrigued. 

Aside from blueblood, the shelf was stocked with smaller brightly colored boxes that looked like a new brand of candy. The glistening, crystal-like 'sweets' inside were ice blue and reminded Gavin of the extremely sharp kind of menthol bonbons. Also, they had little bags of actual 'thirium lollies'. 

What a time to be alive thought Gavin astoundedly. But, he guessed, it always had been just a question of time before someone came up with the brilliant idea to provide paying Android costumers with all the stuff they could ever want and never would actually need. A start-up brand for Android grocery products. Hell, yeah.

Gavin stood in front of that shelf for almost five whole minutes before he decided to take some stuff with him. Aside from the bonbons and lollies, another thing on the lowest shelf for Android animal pet care caught his interest and Gavin decided quickly to take it as well before he could chicken out of it. 

Back at the counter he gave all the stuff to the young woman and lifted the Countess back up onto his shoulders. The woman serenely smiled as she scanned everything in. "You read the warnings, Mister?", she asked and Gavin swallowed a scoff. "Would have been hard to ignore. It's not for me."

Her eyes flicked upwards to his face. "The chemicals mixed within the thirium in these products could cause damage to your CA-T007. Her supply of thirium might be too low to safely filter and isolate the additional ingredients."

Gavin's brows snapped up. "Uh... thanks for the warning. Really. But I'm not in the habit of feeding candy to my cat. It's not for her either." 

She stared. She didn't make the typical 'aaah!' noise but her brows lifted in a pregnant pause as she nodded through an indulgent smile. "I see", she said, whatever she saw. "Happy and lovely holidays to you, Mr. Reed", she said as she gave the shopping bag back into his arms. 

Gavin took it with a bit of hesitation. "Ah... yeah. To you too... uh..."

Her following smile was almost blinding. "Nora!"

Gavin nodded distractedly and took half of a step back from the counter, not sure what to say. "Yeah... to you too, Nora", he finally murmured. "Take care."

As Gavin finally walked back home, he came to ask himself if there might be any Androids at the Christian communal church service this evening. 

Were there Androids believing in god...?

* * *

Not that many hours later Gavin stood in front of his wardrobe and frowned irritably at his own reflection in the mirror. It almost felt like he had a face-off with a stranger. 

Gavin hadn't worn a suit and tie since that one DPD Christmas gathering he had been part of somewhere around ten years ago. But now he was about to have dinner with a fucking billionaire, like... what even were the expectations...? Should he wear a god damn waistcoat for this?!

At least, he thought bitterly, with a tie already bound around his neck, he had something convenient at hand to hang himself when everything went exactly as he already expected. With nervously quivering knees Gavin sat down at the foot of his bed and shoved his hands roughly through his shaggy hair. 

Again he eyed up his reflection. In his rumpled dress shirt and the only loosely fitting black jacket, he looked like a sordid waiter. He looked 'ridiculous'.

The Countess made a funny little noise while she watched him from her place on his pillow. 

"You think so?", he asked her mindlessly while he kept staring at his own reflection. He could still change his mind and wear his old dress uniform just to wave the one achievement around he actually had going for himself. But, looking at it now, he wouldn't even have 'that' if it wasn't for Kamski. Gavin let out a sharp sigh as prickling heat began to sizzle under the sunken skin of his face. 

Another thing to mull over was that he looked kind of squalid. He hadn't shaved in almost two weeks, so his face was framed by rough, wiry hair he wouldn't want to call a fully grown beard yet. He assumed he could shave it off now but he mostly had it grown out so his ill-white skin, the dark shadows under his eyes or the sore red freckles over his cheeks and nose wouldn't be the focus of anyone he dared to talk to. 

His hair was also way longer than it used to and started to curl, especially in his nape. When Gavin looked into the mirror today, he saw a person he hadn't seen in a very long time. Also a person he hoped so damn much to never ever see again. Distractedly the fingers of his left hand traced over the scar above his nose. 

"Maybe it's just a big party full of rich fucks and none of this will matter", he murmured through numb feeling lips. The official invitation he had gotten in the mail some days ago gave absolutely nothing away. Gavin couldn't even remember the last time he had gotten an actual letter. The card had looked ridiculously expensive and smelled of pine trees.

Anyway.

His wardrobe shook as he finally kicked it shut and with a huff crossed his arms tightly in front of his chest. Suit and tie were fine for anyone, so these fucking bigwigs could stick it. 

He might not look well but many people fell ill this time of the year. There was no way they could see the shallow scars lining the inside of his lungs or the ones in the crook of his elbows. What they could instantly recognize was that he wasn't one of them. And that was alright with him. Gavin bared his teeth at his own reflection and hated the pointless fear in its eyes. 

Finally, he twitched out of his somber thoughts when the Countess whined loudly at his feet and stretched up to reach for him. In a well-trained habit, he leaned instantly down and picked her up into his arms. "Meeh!", she commented with emphasis, before she stretched up and licked soothingly over his scar. 

Such a welcome distraction. With a low groan, Gavin hugged her tightly to his chest and simply let himself fall back into his bed.

* * *

As the time was finally right and he good to go, Gavin froze up while his fingers almost pressed little indents into the knob of his front door. He really, really didn't want to go. Family hadn't been his business for such a long time. 

But Gavin wasn't a coward. He wasn't. Mommy didn't raise a quitter, he thought bitterly as he scoffed over the back of his hand. Gavin 'was' no quitter - yet not for the lack of trying. Nervous energy sizzled under his skin and made the muscles in his abdomen twitch and shift in useless tension. 

Again his gaze flickered over his shoulder and roamed through the dark and empty living room. Empty but for his little companion. 

Like every time Gavin left her at home, the Countess had curled in a ridiculously wide half-circle around her favorite couch cushion and seemed to snooze the way cats just did. She didn't seem like she cared, really.

Gavin stared at her tiny twitching paws and her delicate chest, that expanded rhythmically with little gasps of cooling breath - and then finally decided that no. Just 'no'. No!

Before he could chicken out of his dumbass decision, he stomped over on stiff legs and gathered her resting body up into his arms. As soon as he touched her she twitched into active mode, but thank the gods wasn't bothered at all. Gavin breathed a sigh of relief as he cuddled her close.

"You, princess, are coming with me", he said in a determined tone of voice, even though his stomach was sinking the nearer he got them both to the door. Then he suddenly remembered his purchases and almost slipped as he took a last turn into the kitchen to stuff his jacket pockets full and distract himself a last time from the wrecking humiliation which awaited him right at the door of Kamskis place.

He had no idea what he should do with his cat, but it felt like an unforgettably grand dick move to leave the Countess all alone for her first major holiday. Aside from that Gavin needed a presence that reminded him that he was an actual human being right now. The buzzing inside his head and limbs made him sluggish and the sudden spike of stress made minutes blend together in his mind. 

Gavin had no idea what he was doing as he fell into the driver seat of his car. His teeth clattered but not only from the cold. 

Gavin took a deep ice-cold breath and held it until his fingertips started to tingle. Then he looked at the Countess who rode shotgun for the first time in her life and leaned up as the car was still standing to gaze out of the frost edged window. Gavin twitched as the lights went out but finally got his shit together enough to start the engine. 

For a tiny moment, he contemplated taking her with him. If somebody asked stupid questions he still could tell them to fuck off and leave him and his emotional support Android well alone. Emotional support - it wouldn't even be a lie. 

But the thing was, Gavin remembered all too well how it felt to get dragged around by a person wielding power over him. How he had been forced to act as a buffer between said person and the rest of the world. How Joel hadn't feared God nor devil because Gavin had always been -...

Just... no. Gavin took another deep breath and shook his head through a dark frown. He wouldn't do that to her. The Countess deserved a peaceful holiday full of hugs and kitten kisses, even though she was a snarky menace with an inbuild superiority complex. Gavin had to improvise if he wanted her in good hands for the evening. 

With something cold and clammy squirming through his guts he waited for another car to pass them by before he pulled his own around.

* * *

So, they ended up like this. 

The weather was already cold enough to freeze to death and still, Gavin couldn't get his shit together enough to just go over there and simply knock at the door. Almost literally frozen into place he stood shivering at the side of his car and leaned, with his arms tightly crossed in front of his chest, back against its body-work. In his ill-fitting suit and tie, out there alone in the snow, he most likely looked like some wannabe romantic stalker. The motor was still running in a low and steady purr while the headlights made flickering shades appear in the dark of the soundless snowfall.

Gavin had rolled down the driver's car window, so the heating burned against his lower back while the Countess stretched her long neck outside to take an excited look around like any kid on Christmas.   
The bleak little house on the other side of the road was illuminated by some colorful Christmas lights if nothing else. Gavin had just barely stopped himself from running over that silly misshapen snowman by the walkway.

With her front paws, the Countess leaned against the car door and looked up at Gavin with a wide stare of excited anticipation. "Meeh!", she said.

But Gavin had lost himself already inside of his own head. Strangely, he could remember crystal clear when he had been at this place the last time. It felt like a lifetime ago. Almost as if it had never happened at all.

Cole Anderson had still been around back then. It must have been a Thursday since Gavin had picked the boy up from school. His dad had always worked double shifts through Thursdays. 

The Lieutenant's house had looked like an early Halloween nightmare. Lots of lights, a still empty but colorful candy basket by the front door and some frozen pumpkins which flanked the driveway and the garage left and right. What Cole and his father had drawn onto its overhead door had made the garage look like a gateway to another dimension. 

Like every Thursday for almost two years in a row, Gavin had stayed for the next five to six hours to make sure the little shit made his homework, ate something worthwhile and got to bed at acceptable hours. 

At that last thursday Gavin had engaged the boy into a big discussion about dogs. Little dogs, big dogs, dogs with long glossy coats or ones with pelts that felt like wire brushes. That evening Gavin had left the Lieutenants house while texting him some suggestions for Christmas.

The weekend had come and gone and on Monday the Lieutenants desk had stayed empty all day. Nobody told Gavin anything about what had happened. He had to read about it some days later in the local newspaper. Today Gavin's best guess was that he had been way too hostile to anyone but complete strangers or Anderson himself. 

Nobody had wanted to talk with him about the accident since Gavin never before had presented himself as a guy with a sense of empathy or any kind of compassion. Or as a guy who cared at all. And Gavin? He hadn't felt close enough to anyone else to ask questions. 

Lieutenant Anderson came back as early as the next week with an arm in a sling, a pronounced limp and dozens of black and yellow bruises as well as some deep stitched up scratches on his sunken face. His previously healthy and all but golden hair had turned blunt and grey almost overnight. 

He had stayed for almost four full days until his first public break down tore like a natural disaster through the precinct. 

Anderson's fall from grace had come fast upon him.

The drunken stupor even faster.

Gavin hadn't known and still didn't, how to deal with the following fallout since there had just been no way for him to find any words to say. There was nothing he could have said that would have made a difference or would have made anything easier. So he had rather said nothing at all.

And aside from the unpredictable bone heavy grief, Andersons as well as his own, or the pain about not knowing what to do, there already 'had' been hell flaring up all around him. Over time Gavin had lost the details, but he still remembered being so stressed out that he sometimes forgot where he had parked his patrol car, which passcodes in his notebook were good for what and at his worst days hadn't even been able to remember his own fucking home address.

His blood must have been so full of cortisol and other stress-related hormones, his monthly bloodwork should have come back marked as toxic. 

So, the following November Gavin had done something insanely selfish and stupid and still, Anderson had reached out to him even though he had done it completely fucked up drunk and drained. The man had sat at Gavin's bedside and had held his hand like his own father should have done. 

What had shattered between them back in the days, what had made them both so mad, vicious and bitter - it never had gotten the chance to air and heal. To this day, it still was raw. It still hurt.

Gavin let out a low and long groan while the fingers of his right hand stroked along the bridge of his itching nose. Stiffly he leaned back and bit his lower lip as his face contorted into a burdened snarl. 

'All' of this was literally old news to him. There was no reason for why these memories still made his chest go hot and tight. Gavin felt utterly ridiculous as he rubbed roughly over his reddened face. Like a complete ninny. And he still couldn't get his shit together and just knock at that god damn-... 

Suddenly Anderson's front door opened.

Gavin forced his burning eyes to open and felt his breath escape his chest in a rush of gentle white fog the moment he recognized him. 

Nines went on soundless steps out onto the porch and softly closed the door behind himself. Then he simply walked across the road to Gavin through a smooth sheet of snow.

Like Gavin, he didn't wear a coat. He didn't even wear shoes. Gavin opened his mouth without finding anything to say. To see Nines walk barefoot through the soft haze of the snowfall felt kind of unreal since he didn't even react to the ice that gathered in his dark eyelashes.

He looked good. So much more relaxed. The green Christmas-themed sweater he wore was still the ugliest thing Gavin had seen in a long while. A warm welcome to one of the most treasured faux Christian traditions this time of the year.

"Uh... hey...", Gavin mumbled in a lame greeting after he had managed to awkwardly clear his throat. He felt so god damn out of place. Irritated he shifted his weight while dark red blotches crawled up his neck. 

Nines didn't care at all for Gavin's obvious thorns or even for the socially acceptable closeness of two co-workers meeting in the middle of a dark and snowy street. He came to stand almost toe to toe with him and cast his shadow like a warming blanket all over Gavin's smaller figure.

'Co-workers'. Gavin opened his mouth only to foolishly stutter to a halt again. Co-workers wasn't quite right, was it...? After all what had happened in the last five to six weeks. What even were they now, anyway?

Gavin wasn't above asking really stupid questions, but the moment he looked up again and into Nines so very calm and silently observing eyes... he didn't really care anymore. Gavin had no close friends - basically no family. There was no need to somehow convert the feeling of his awkwardly stuttering heart into words for others to judge and pick apart. 

Another sudden leap of thought made his mouth go dry as he remembered the realization, the epiphany, he had had in his youth as Anderson had picked Gavin up for the first time from his assigned rehab center. 

The cognition that the world had suddenly gotten a hell of a lot larger. That Gavin might not have to die young after all but could maybe even get the opportunity to survive and grow. Become an adult and grow out of his nightmares. So that he maybe even got the chance to actually 'become someone'. 

Back then Gavin had listened long hours to Anderson groan, whine and lament about the most boring parts of his job and for the first time in so god damn many miserable years had seen someone worthwhile. Someone who cared. Not only about Gavin, but about 'people'. Gavin had wanted so desperately to be like that. He had wanted to be a Detective.

But right now he looked up at Nines, into his gleaming eyes full of rather misplaced affection, and only wanted to be his. 

The realization made his heart hurt and squeezed all cooling breath out of his hitching lungs.

Thank the gods Nines was brilliantly observant and maybe even the most intelligent creature alive - but that still made him no mind reader. Gavin's face flushed in almost paralyzing fear and embarrassment anyway. 

Of course, Nines didn't 'know' what Gavin was thinking. But on the basis of his partners completely out of control vital signs, he most likely could form a lot of educated guesses. The smile blooming on his face was wonky and awkward and felt utterly perfect. 

"Hello, Detective", he murmured lowly while his body tilted even further into Gavin's personal space. "What are you doing out here. You are cold."

His body radiated so much warmth, almost like a space heater. Gavin blinked numbly and made a little noise as the thought caught up with him, that Nines maybe even did it on purpose.

Unsettled Gavin burrowed his fingertips in the folds of his wide black sleeves and rolled his eyes to finally have an excuse to no longer stare into Nines' like some brain dead creep. "Yeah, yeah. I'm-... I..."

He came again to a stuttering halt as he realized he hadn't even a good excuse for lurking outside in the dark. Right now, he wasn't even sure why he had regarded it as a good idea in the first place. He let out a deep huff of air that drifted through the falling snow as a thick white cloud while his gaze sunk down to the ground at his feet. The Countess made a little chirping noise and snuggled her head against his left elbow. "I...", he muttered and wrinkled his nose in silent irritation. "I didn't want her to be lonely." 

Gavin's upper lip twitched into a toothless snarl while he shifted until he could see the CA-T007 out of the corner of his eyes. "I-... it's Christmas and- ... you know..."

He shrugged in an almost aggressive manner and felt so very uncomfortable. So utterly ridiculous. 

Nines didn't smile this time, but there was a silent lilt in his voice that sounded rather amused. "Actually, I don't know anything about that. But I suppose I will get there."

Nines' own gaze flickered over his shoulder back to the front door of the Anderson household. Something was going on inside there and if Gavin held his breath he could hear Anderson's booming laughter. 

Gavin pulled a face in revulsion and huffed in sudden anger. "You will learn to hate your relatives soon enough just like the rest of us. Maybe even sooner, since you are so smart", he bit out under his breath.

"You know, he doesn't hate you."

Gavin's head shot up instantly. Nines narrowed his eyes and looked at him almost like he wanted to cut Gavin open and lay him bare. Like he didn't understand but desperately wanted to. Gavin forcefully swallowed down the knot that tried to tie up his throat. "Who?", he rasped lowly.

Another smile bloomed slowly on Nines' artfully pale face. This time he tried a template design of reassurance. It didn't suit him very well. Something about it felt off, subtle enough to make it feel quite uncanny. "Both of them", Nines remarked confidently, anyway.

Gavin couldn't hold back his skeptical snort and drummed with his fingers nervously along the crooks of his elbows. "Anderson has all the rights to hate my fucking guts", he hissed. They both were entitled to their own resentments. Gavin because he had been abandoned and forgotten and Anderson for all the reminders of his greatest failures. "And all my own brother ever got from me was twenty years of clean up duty."

"Gavin."

Nines' voice sounded unusually sharp. The change was sudden enough to spook Gavin right out of his bitter thoughts. Nervously Gavin took a deep, shivering breath before he found the courage to look up into Nines' eyes again. He appeared to be... strangely sad. To Gavin, it felt rather unreal. Irritated he wrinkled his nose. "You don't have to-..."

"I don't know how I can make you finally understand that people care about you. More people than you even realize", the bastard interrupted him. While he spoke Nines' shoulders sunk down in a cheap imitation of a so very human sigh. His eyes narrowed, searching, as he shifted his weight to lean even deeper into Gavin's space. 

Then Nines' right hand grasped gently for his jacket sleeve and pulled Gavin slowly out of his defensive position. "Gavin", he said oh so very softly. "You are 'loved'."

Gavin's breath stuttered and then just... stopped. His heart seemed to do the same. His head was suddenly full of rushing static noise and he felt a coppery taste on his tongue. 

"I... I'm-...", he rasped and couldn't string even two words together. Completely hoarse and hurting he tried to clear his throat of that hateful emotional swell, but it just didn't go away. 

Nines lifted his left hand. His inhumanly warm fingertips seemed to burn gently drawn patterns into Gavin's icy skin. 

Gavin's breath hitched around a low noise while his heart was determined to leap right out of his chest. His own hands hovered anxiously somewhere in front of it because Gavin had absolutely no idea what to do with them.

But Nines seemed to know exactly what he wanted to do with his own. 

Gavin twitched almost violently as Nines' right one gently touched down on his shoulder. Nines observed him with a calculating stare before his fingertips followed his arm all the way down until his long and elegant fingers gently closed around Gavin's left hand. In a familiar gesture full of warmth and affection he pressed their palms together, while he took that one last step closer. 

Now they stood chest to chest and Gavin was burning with all those feelings that squirmed like a knot of a dozen ice-cold eels through his shivering guts and gave their traitorous best to squeeze around his hammering heart.

Nines tilted his head down. His nose brushed like a whisper along Gavin's scar while his left thumb seemed to test the density and texture - the feeling - of Gavins raggedly beard. 

Gavin let out a breath so hot it seemed to burn him from the inside out while his head turned into Nines' palm all on its own. Nines' smile was blinding. "Don't be so stubborn, Detective", he murmured low and full of warmth. "The Lieutenant doesn't hate you. And neither does Connor, nor Mr. Kamski."

Gavin swallowed uselessly and clenched his jaw as his gaze dropped again to the ground. "Well, they should."

"No."

The glance in Nines' eyes was firm and now he looked almost exasperated. Like Gavin sometimes looked at the Countess when she got herself stuck under the couch. Gavin's brows dipped into a frown and in direct answer, it seemed, Nines breathed a voiceless sigh. "Gavin... is the thought of being hated so much easier to bear, as it means you don't have to acknowledge the people reaching out to you?"

Gavin's brain seemed to have caught frostbite since his train of thoughts completely crashed there. Numbly he blinked and didn't know what to say. 

"I'm-... It's not-...", he stuttered uselessly before he took a deep breath even though his lungs hurt already from the cold. "Nines, it's -... people... don't get on with me. I don't get on with them. It just... it just 'is'."

Nines observed the conflict on his face while his own turned rather blank again. But Gavin was sure he understood this on a level as no other person around them did. Emotional investment into unpredictable people-... It changed things. Trust felt dangerous to people like Gavin. All it did was make things needlessly complicated and turned even the most harmless conversation into a socially accepted minefield. 

Nines simply kissed him. 

Gavin twitched in surprise, but then he closed his eyes, already feeling hypnotized by Nines' scalding hot touch. He had no idea what had sparked this, but Nines just went on to melt all of Gavin's bones away and pressed him gently back against the car. His touch was so very careful but also felt restrained in a way that made the lazy endorphins in Gavins bloodstream sing in pure delight.

Time was relative or maybe even a lie.

Gavin gasped as Nines broke the kiss. He felt lightheaded and daft and only wanted to lean in again - but then he heard and felt it, too. The low hum of Gavins vibrating phone in his pocket. Nines took not even half a step back to give him space, but Gavin instantly missed his warmth. 

"Could it be Mr. Kamski?", Nines asked, almost conversational while he watched Gavin fumble the phone out of his pants. Gavin flushed in humiliation just by the thought of it. It almost felt like being walked in on. His face flushed with so much heat, it even seemed to narrow down his field of vision. "No. He wouldn't message me, hasn't ever, it's -..."

His jaw clicked shut as soon as he opened his messenger. Dumbfounded he stared at the picture sent to him.

Nines stood so close to him, his bare left foot nudged between Gavin's shoes. His right arm gently wound around Gavin's waist while his hand pressed flat and warming into Gavins lower back. Their depicted kiss looked so warm and fragile, it might even have had the power to make passersby cry. Around their heads hovered at least a dozen brightly neon-colored hearts out of an outdated social media filter. At the height of their elbows was placed the white outline of a big arrow-pierced heart that framed the letters 'R+A'.

Gavin's head shot around to the car window. The Countess, who rested her little elbows on the door, only flattened her ears and licked her lips in a gesture that looked so much like the Android cat equivalent of a risen middle finger. "Meh", she commented dryly. 

Gavin broke out into knee-weakening laughter. Nines had to pull him up and support his weight since Gavin's legs suddenly felt like wet spaghetti. The Countess didn't care. She had no shame at all.   
Even though Nines did, seemingly.   
Gavin looked up at him and even though his LED had been replaced by a beautifully irregular white spider web break at his temple, it wasn't hard to interpret Nines daunting stare as a harbinger of murder.

But the Countess was a fearless little beast. She returned his stare with one of her own, showing off how unimpressed she felt by him. But she seemed to have forgotten that Nines wasn't Gavin.

Faster than anything Gavin had ever seen, Nines hand shot out and grabbed the Countess by the artificial scruff of her neck. Something was going on between the two of them as he lifted her to face him. Some kind of conversation. Gavin gave his best to stop himself from reaching out and correct Nines' grip on her. He knew Nines wouldn't hurt her and aside from that, the Countess wasn't a brittle creature. 

An interface happened between them and whatever data was shared, it made Nines slowly tilt his head like a lurking reptile. The Countess answered with a completely relaxed yawn while her LED danced in bright blue circles. As she looked back up again her tongue stuck out of her mouth in a tiny little blep.

Nines turned almost mechanically around to Gavin and whatever he saw on his face made his eyes narrow down. "Yeet", he then said without inflection.

Gavin wasn't prepared.

Without a motion to catch momentum that would have caught Gavins attention, Nines turned only slightly around on his heel - and then threw.

At the exact same time, Anderson's front door broke suddenly open with a massive bang and Connor stumbled onto the lawn, so urgently he tripped over the agitated dog between his legs and almost had to crawl the last three steps to make it. He caught the Countess securely in a ten out of ten nose dive. "Fucking-... NINES!!!", he gasped through a mouth full of snow.

Gavin knew how it felt to die. He was almost sure this time he was done for. Laughter shook him so intensely, it sized up his chest and almost strangled his hitching lungs.   
Ugly tears streamed down his face as he wheezed for breath and held onto Nines elbow to stop himself from falling flat on his face.

He needed a moment. Maybe even two. Especially as Connor got back onto his feet and began to holler uncensored abuse at his younger brother who simply didn't care. Because he rather stared at Gavin.

As soon as his gaze crossed Nines' again, Gavin's laughter caught in his chest. His heart suddenly jumped through another loop. Nines lifted his hand and pointed with his thumb into Connor's general direction. "Did you see that?", he asked. "That was trust. It wasn't hard."

Gavin couldn't help the ugly snort and dismissed Nines' comment with a wave of his hand after he had rubbed the wet stains from his cheeks. "You weren't the one who got thrown, tho."

As if to help underline Gavin's point the Countess loudly whined her discomfort while she clawlessly clawed herself around Connor's neck like a furless kind of stola. Nines only blinked. "What difference does it make?", he said with a tilt of his head.

Both of them decided to completely ignore Connor - and Hank for that matter as the old bastard got out on the porch, too, to investigate what all the ruckus was about. Gavin frowned. "If she had gotten hurt, what is it to you? Compassion only gets you so far."

Nines slowly nodded. His brows shifted in a subtle movement as he followed Gavin's line of thought. "Yes", he said and Gavin almost thought they were done here. "But she is no cat. I am no man. Her pain would be mine. We are connected. So I trust my brother to handle a part of me. To catch 'me' through 'her'."

Gavin opened his mouth, surprised. Of course, Nines wasn't human in the same way as he was. But still. Frowning he licked his lips. Nines' eyes twitched down as they followed the tiny movement. "But... even then", Gavin began slowly. "The Countess is her own person, isn't she? Throwing her around is still different from potentially hurting yourself?"

Nines smiled as patient as a saint. He shook his head. "The way it is", he said as slowly as Gavin with a weird emphasis on the last word. "It actually isn't. Gavin, our system version of 'consciousness' and 'personhood' is so radically different from yours. You would be surprised."

Gavin tried his best to imagine it. A kind of floating existence, somehow not dependant on its physical form. More than a body and a brain. Like the last time he tried, he couldn't really get it. But suddenly he had a rough idea. "So you tell me", he murmured with a bit of hesitation. "You are just a spark in there? And so is she?"

Nines smiled and radiated so much warmth and happiness. "In a way. We are alive. We are one and many and none at all."  
Gavin sure as hell didn't understand a single word of that. But he guessed he kind of got the message. 'Kind of'.

"Sooo", he murmured."You tell me you want me to trust you the next time you throw me at other people?"

Nines tilted his head and slightly nodded his affirmation. "It is way more likely for me to throw other people at you, Detective. But still, yes."

That 'Detective' there had to be pure sass if Gavin had ever heard it. Lowly he hummed as he nodded, even though he didn't understand a thing.

Nines closed his hand around Gavins as he smiled. "Go and see your brother, Gavin. You are already late."

Gavin narrowed his eyes the closer Nines body swayed to his own - as if it was caught in a magnetic pull. "The cat-..."

"We will take care of her", Nines said with emphasis, all to convince Gavin to finally let it go. Gavin closed his eyes and breathed a deep but voiceless sigh. "Thanks..."

Nines simply kissed him. Again. 

This time Gavin didn't get caught in a brain freeze but reached all too readily out for him. In a tight grip, he curled his fingers around Nines' whose hand prickled with the flow of static energy. The human imitation bled away from his palm like it always did when he touched Gavin's skin. All the while Gavin sunk the fingers of his left hand into Nines' hair to desperately pull him closer. Doubtlessly he didn't imagine the shiver that hummed down the Android's entire spine. 

Unfortunately, the silence of the snowfall got disturbed by an extremely sharp and thrilling wolf whistle. At Anderson's side, Connor raised his fist and whooped with a big and goofy grin on his stupid face.

Gavin felt almost feral as he swayed on his heels and leaned around Nines' broad figure. "Oh, you have to be fucking-... PISS OFF!!"

Anderson had crossed his arms in front of his bulky chest and grinned as wide and as dangerous as a shark. "Sorry for not lifting a boombox. The things got kinda out of style."

Gavin wanted to strangle him. He widened his eyes and pressed a hand flat to his chest. "Oh, that's so damn sad", his eyes narrowed down as he shot around and pointed sharply at Connor. "Connor, play fucking despacito!"

Out of the corner of his eyes, he could see Nines face switch into his 'let me google that' template expression. Anderson barked heated laughter while he reached out and propped himself up on Connor's shoulder who obviously didn't understand. The picture of them both looked quite funny since the smaller Android stood straight as the strongest pillar even against Anderson's massive weight. "Fuck off, Reed. Choke on a dime", the Lieutenant snarled right back even though he never lost his highly amused expression while he pressed the fingers of his right hand in the shape of an 'L' to his forehead. 

Humiliating heat crept up Gavin's neck. "And a happy new year", he grunted under his breath in a sort of juvenile backtalk. He gave Nines a pointed look, but the guy only shrugged with a crooked little smile on his face. Gavin huffed exhaustedly and stuffed his hands into the pockets of his jacket. He twitched as he found something there he had completely forgotten about. 

In a huff, he gave the little white and blue box into Nines' hands without feeling the energy to look up into his eyes. "Didn't have the stuff to wrap it up", he murmured. "It's for her. And you, too, I guess."

Nines' voice had a curious tilt to it as he took it. The box was small enough to easily fit into the palm of his hand. "A memory chip, I see."

Gavin nodded under a voiceless sigh and roughly scratched along the crown of his unruly hair. "A touch memory core", he mumbled while he wrinkled his nose. "No Idea if it's actually useful. The storage space isn't as big as it could be. But I-... I just thought..."

Gavin took a deep breath and shook his head through a huff of hot air. "Okay, just forget it, it's not-..."

Scalding fingertips snatched hold of his chin and tilted Gavin's head upward. Nines' eyes were full of warm affection, even though the rest of his face didn't give anything away. "She will love it", he said slowly. "As do I."

Gavin pulled grimace and tilted his head, even though reluctantly, out of his gentle touch. "Stop being so disgustingly happy."

Nines' answer was simply a lifted eyebrow. 

"Alright...", huffed Gavin and turned around on the heels of his completely soaked shoes. "I'll be on my way then. With some luck, Lijah thought I would chicken out anyway and isn't there when I get to the place."

Nines chuckled. "He will be", he said with conviction and a crooked as well as goofy smile on his stupidly handsome face.

Gavin opened the driver's door while an irritated sniff pulled wrinkles all over the bridge of his nose. "Yet one can dream. See you Wednesday, then."

Nines seemed surprised. Almost as if he had forgotten about it. Or until now had thought Gavin had been joking. His head tilted to the side as his eyes went almost comically wide. "See y-you later", he finally answered through an odd little stutter. "Gavin."

Gavin stared at him like an utter dumbass. 

Finally, with a face flushed in a dangerous shade of red, he decided it was time to go. With an aggressive hum, Gavin turned around and threw himself into the driver seat. In the same movement, he wanted to close the door but suddenly a big hairy hand slammed down and held it open. 

Anderson had appeared right beside his car, seemingly out of fucking nowhere - almost like one of the three ghosts of Christmas eve - in his embarrassing 'Merry Christmas Ya Filthy Animal' sweater and now basically looked at anything but the man he was holding up. "Uh...", he mumbled through a crooked snarl into his scruffy beard. "Just, uh... take care. An' stuff."

Flippantly he waved about the general direction of the snowy road ahead. 

Gavin felt his stomach drop. He didn't instantly respond but grappled Anderson's wrist and forced his hand away from the door before he slammed it shut. "How would it be for you useless, old and drunk 'bastard' to mind your own fucking business", he hissed through his bared teeth. Then he closed the driver's window and stomped down on the accelerator, satisfied by Andersons barked out curses when he got speckled with snow slush as Gavin took off. 

* * *

Gavin reached the Kamski Manor on the outskirts of Detroit around ten-thirty and stalled the engine of his car somewhere in the snowdrifts down the line of its massive driveway. Shivering Gavin sat completely frozen into place until the interior lights went out. His ice-cold hands, yet clawed into the driving wheel, hurt like a god damn bitch as Gavin leaned slightly forward to stare out of haunted eyes through his windshield at that completely ridiculous building. 

The blocky thing looked like Elijah hadn't been satisfied by just the invention of the most common Android technology throughout the US, but had also felt the need to design a completely new and unique shape, only to fuck with any person's mind who got unfortunate enough to find themselves invited to his place. Maybe it was meant to scare journalists away. If so, it seemed to work quite well.

The Mansions windows Gavin could make out from his point of view were dark and empty. Strangely enough, there also were no other cars around. Gavin hissed a curse through his clenched jaw as he realized he must have fucked up the address. Or, well, not the address since that weirdly shaped monstrosity was obviously Kamskis. But that didn't mean Gavin couldn't have misremembered the meeting place somehow. Or maybe he had been right all along and Kamski had already forgotten about him.

Gavin's heart was beating so hard in his chest, he felt completely dizzy with it. His knees locked up in a tense form of stress reaction and he really, really didn't want to go over there. The longer he sat, the louder got that static noise that filled his ears, rushing louder than even his own stuttering breaths.

Gavin closed his eyes and swallowed around the tight knot in his throat. Heavily he leaned back into the car seat and forced his stomach and chest muscles to stretch. Then he took a deep breath and held it until his fingertips began to tingle. Forcefully he breathed out. Then he repeated the process.

With shaking hands he fumbled his phone out of his pocket and stared for at least three whole minutes at the numbers displayed in his contact list. He was still angry and annoyed, but then he decided to send his message anyway. Even though he sent it deliberately to the wrong person.

> **\- Reed -** I am here, Kamski is maybe too and I fucking hate you

He typed his message with enough speed to sent it before he even could reconsider. The answer came as usual in the blink of an eye. 

> **\- # 313 248 317 - 43 -** No you don't, Detective. 

Gavin wrinkled his nose and let out a silent snort. His thumb jumped over the display of his phone and sent the text before his brain caught up with his own childish bullcrap.

> **\- Reed -** You sound way too sure. How very dare 

Nines answer came instantly and had this amused little lilt to it, that Gavin could somehow even hear through its text form. 

> **\- # 313 248 317 - 43 -** Well, Detective. I am able to track your heart beat and at the same time analyze the concentration of hormones in your salvia while I kiss you. I have proof.

Gavin's face flushed again with blinding heat. Dizzily he stared at the message and just... couldn't deal. Nines should be required to carry a license for this god damn high-tech robo-brain. Roughly Gavin rubbed a hand over his face and cleared his throat. 

> **\- Reed -** Ink nvoluntarily provided evident, not usable I'm a court of law

He typed blindly and hit send even though autocorrect ran amok on his screen. As Gavin opened his eyes again, he already had a new message. 

> **\- # 313 248 317 - 43 -** I am glad you got there without obstacles. I will tell him, too. 

Annoyed Gavin let out a hot huff of air and bared his teeth around a rough snarl.

> **\- Reed -** No idea who you are talking about. 
> 
> **\- # 313 248 317 - 43 -** I am sure you do, detective. 

Gavin stared at his phone and pulled a rather sour grimace. What did 'he' care for Anderson's sudden paranoia. It wasn't that drunk bastards job to play his dad. He only did it when it suited him, anyway.

Gavin closed his eyes. 

Anyway.

In a sudden flurry of movement, he pulled the car keys free and grasped the whiskey bottle in the shotgun seat footwell. His fingers also touched a rustling plastic bag and only now Gavin remembered that weird thirium based stuff he had also bought in the corner store that afternoon. Then he remembered Chloe.

With fingers stiff and hurting from the icy cold, Gavin pulled the bag of bright blue candies into his arms as well and opened the driver's door with a strong kick before he went on to crawl out of his car as fast and graceful as his frozen arms and legs allowed for.

His knees locked into a stiff and almost painfully tense marching step. Gavin basically 'charged' the nightmare black front door of that godforsaken place. He didn't give himself time to stop and think, because it was likely he would just come to his senses and leave before he humiliated himself even further.

With all the momentum of his movement, Gavin lifted a fist and slammed it three times in a row against the blackened wood. All the while his eyes were busied with their twitching search for some imaginary enemy which gaze Gavin seemed to be able to feel prickle all over his nape. Paralyzing fear kept him in its painful grasp, so he didn't even notice the in hindsight rather obvious doorbell.

Gavin didn't exactly expect a reaction since the building was dark and most likely empty anyway. But even though his heart pushed up into his throat and made him feel rather nauseous, later he wanted at least to be able to say that he had 'tried'. No idea how effective that crop out would be since he already felt like a rather pathetic moron.

Seconds crept by and Gavin froze at the door like a deer caught in headlights. The burst of desperate courage he had ridden, burned itself out rather fast and now he was way too terrified to lift his shaking fist to knock a second time. Hyper focused on his surroundings Gavin even took notice of that cheap and brightly pink front lawn flamingo, almost completely covered under a snowdrift just some steps away from him.

Fearful silence rung in Gavin's ears and covered him like a shroud. In the darkness of the night, the falling snow felt like an ice-cold whisper on his skin. Gavin's muscles quivered in little wave-like spasms and the clattering of his teeth seemed almost unbearable loud in his ears.

No one opened, no one was there. If nothing else Gavin should feel relieved, but-...

The door opened in a soundless and gentle sway. The bright blue eyes of an old-school ST200 fixated Gavin while she tilted her head in a mute inquiry. Gavin felt his heart drop through the floor. "Uh... hello, I'm... uh ...", he stammered helplessly while his eyes went wide. The ST200 blinked - and suddenly her kind of shy body language completely changed. A bright smile lit up her face and gave her hollow eyes suddenly a conscious spark. "Gavin!"

She pulled the door open wide enough to slip through and then closed both of her arms around Gavin's neck in a warm and tight hug. She didn't seem to care for the thin sheet of ice on his jacket or his frozen hair. She simply went on and pulled him along inside. 

"Elijah was so worried!", she chattered softly while she pulled Gavin through a kind of lobby with an awfully big and simply obnoxious portrait of his brother on the wall. All the while her LED danced through excited blue and yellow circles. The ST200 - Chloe...? - didn't care for the wet footprints Gavin left behind, even though he himself very much did. 

Gavin felt like an intruder in some kind of sterile and shiny world he simply wasn't a part of. Was that a pool on the other side of the room...?! 

Gavin felt already dizzy, maybe a side effect of the sudden warmth he got pulled into, but still, something seemed so utterly wrong with the layout of this place. 

"Elijah wasn't sure you would come. I said you would. I knew you would. But you know him, he always strives for the drama", Chloe said with a giggle and lead him through some more big and shiny rooms until they stopped in front of a silvern double bolted security door. Swiftly her fingers danced over the touch panel and as it lightened up green she gave Gavin a little shove. "Go to him", she whispered with a wide smile. "I make something ready for you."

Then she turned and ran off into the direction they both had come from. Gavin had no idea what she even wanted to 'make ready' for him, but he guessed... he had much bigger concerns right now. A shiver ran down his spine as he turned back to the door and was left in the exactly same situation as just moments before outside. Again he swallowed thickly around that knot in his throat and lifted his quivering hand to the door handle. Slowly he pushed it open. 

The room he now entered was pitch black but for some fleetingly blinking lights around the walls. The walls that happened to be rows and rows of server towers. There was a steady electric hum in the air that reminded Gavin instantly of the noise made by Nines' thirium pump regulator. Only a lot louder and somehow even palpable. In the middle of the room was a big pillar of wildly blinking tech stuff, connected through cables of various thickness with the server towers around it. Propped up against the thing sat a person. 

Kamskis eyes behind the glasses were closed and he seemed to have fallen asleep a while ago. Softly Gavin closed the door behind him before he crept nearer. A still half full and fancy looking bottle of Champaign rested by his little brother's hip and instantly made Gavin uncomfortably aware of the heavy whiskey bottle he carried in the crook of his own arm. In Elijahs lap laid a tablet, the only somewhat bright source of light in the room. A rather short audio file played over and over on repeat, so softly that Gavin wasn't able to hear it over of the rushing static in his head. His heart hurt so god damn much from beating so fast. Slowly Gavin crept nearer while he felt his anxiety flare alive under his skin. 

He got startled as suddenly something moved in Kamskis shadow. It was another ST200 who looked out of bright blue eyes up at Gavin and gently pressed a finger to her lips. Then she suggested with a little wave of her hand for him to settle down. Gavin obeyed. He placed himself not quite in front of his brother and looked at Chloe - was it even Chloe? Didn't she leave...? - for any kind of help.

She just smiled, both gentle and patient, before she leaned up and pressed a loving kiss to Kamskis left cheek. "Honey, wake up", she whispered softly into his ear. "You have a visitor."

Kamski stirred and Gavin held his breath.

As soon as Kamskis eyes opened and found his, Gavin felt, again, the burden of a thousand missed opportunities crash down onto his shoulders. "Uh... hey there. Dipshit", he blurted out because he was a fucking idiot and had no idea what else to say. 

He couldn't bear to look into Kamskis eyes so he rather stared at the bottle by his side and awkwardly scratched through the fuzz around his jawline. "I'm, uh... I guess-... m- merry Christmas...?", he stammered and felt all of his insides churn.

Kamski slowly tilted his head, almost as if he had to blink his reality back into focus. His eyes narrowed down. "You look like a cheap penguin", he stated without inflection. 

The tips of Gavin's ears turned red. He swallowed around the tight knot in his throat and narrowed his eyes while prickling heat flushed his face. "An' you like a complete loser."

Kamski only stared at him and the longer he didn't say anything in return the more ridiculous Gavin felt in this strange place so far outside of his comfort zone. 

Suddenly Kamski shot forward. Reflexively Gavin closed his eyes and lifted his arms in defense since he already expected righteous anger and a hit to the face. 

Instead, Kamski threw himself forward and closed both of his arms around Gavin's neck. Tightly enough that he shouldn't have any difficulties to detect Gavin's hammering heartbeat. He didn't say a thing, though. Only clawed his manicured fingernails deeply into Gavins drenched and ice-cold jacket.

Several times Gavin heard him gasp before he finally spoke. "And a happy new year", Kamski croaked breathlessly, his usually so confident voice almost completely swallowed up by emotion. His words were followed by a little hitch in his shoulders as he pressed his face into the crook of Gavin's neck. Silently his glasses clattered to the ground.

The stuff Gavin still held in his arms slid through his numb fingers before he lifted his arms to close them tightly around Kamskis quivering frame. His own chest burned with sudden heartache. The last time they had come this close to another, there hadn't exactly been time for brotherly sentiment. Also, there had been way too many obnoxiously staring bystanders. 

But right now, finally, there was nothing that held Gavin back from squeezing tightly while he remembered a time when between the two of them 'he' still had been 'big brother'.

* * *

Gavin's head was a little slow to catch up with all the following stuff, but it got better when he finally sat down in a chair at a rather normal looking wooden table. A glass of water got placed in front of him while a weirdly fluffy blanket was thrown over his shoulders after an ST200 already had taken his soaked shoes and jacket away.

Kamski sat down in the opposite chair, still near enough to reach for and hold onto Gavin's left arm. Which he did. As if he feared Gavin would just bolt blindly off into the night if no one held him physically back from it. His clean fingernails dug deceivingly strong into Gavin's sleeve. 

Right now Kamski whispered some sweet nothings into the ST200s ear - the one who had followed them out of the server room - who smiled brightly with a little nod, while 'another one' put a plate full of fancy looking Christmas dinner in front of Gavin. So now Gavin's count went up to four. 

Gavin had no idea what he should say to his brother after so many lost years. So he said: "There is a pink plastic flamingo on your front lawn."

Kamski's attention twitched instantly back to him and he seemed to need a moment to remember before he answered. "Oh. Yes, I forgot about that. A present from your Lieutenant."

Gavin narrowed his eyes while he slowly leaned back into his chair. A present. From Hank fucking Anderson. A 'plastic flamingo'. "From my Lieutenant", he stated skeptically. Kamski only nodded. Gavin wrinkled his nose. "...Why?!"

Kamski snorted a laugh. "I'm afraid, I don't know? Some days after the Revolution, while the whole city was still evacuated, Lieutenant Anderson parked on my driveway, got out and placed that abomination outside. Rude, he didn't even say hello. In fact, he was off again before it even came to my notice."

Gavin nodded while he asked himself what a life he was actually living. Sometimes a 'go and fuck yourself' was just a plastic flamingo placed on the front lawn of the richest and most powerful man alive. Nobody could say Anderson had no sense of humor.

"I wanted to greet him and apologize for his first impression he got at our last meeting", spoke a third ST200 that came from god knows where and placed a hot-water bottle in Gavins easy reach.

So, now they were up to five.

Gavin felt like the biggest, kind of racist asshat as he blinked back and forth between the three androids, who gave him not even the slightest chance to tell them apart in any meaningful way. They all wore pretty blue cocktail dresses, no shoes and these pretty smiles that put a spark into their bright blue eyes. Their hairstyles weren't the same but all of them were young, blond and beautiful. Still, there was absolutely nothing Gavin could pick up on in their mannerisms or voices that set them noticeably apart from one another.

Though, it made Gavin not only feel like a shithead. It made him curious, too. "I don't wanna be rude or anything and it might even sound like a cliché", he said slowly and rolled his tongue through his mouth as he frowned. "But... have we ever met before...? Which one of you is 'Chloe'?"

All three Androids stopped either of their motions and looked at him before they giggled and smiled in unison. "We all are", they said and Gavin obviously couldn't follow. With a lifted brow he looked at his brother but Kamski only shrugged. "What she said", was his useless kind of answer, but he also looked obnoxiously smug. Gavin had expected a little Android army of the same model type, all with the same name and face, kind of like Connor and his 'brothers'. But it seemed to be way more complicated than that. Seemingly, Kamski hadn't been able to resist and built himself some type of big and scary network girlfriend. 

"So, we... basically are only three people in this room right now...?", Gavin asked further as the concept grasped his attention. One Chloe hummed like in thought while the other two grinned. "Not quite", they all three said. Gavin looked skeptically from one artificial face to another before he let out a voiceless sigh. "One, many and none... yeah, I guess I get it", he murmured while he actually didn't. 

All three Chloes smiled in a way as if they thought Gavin behaved insanely cute. Gavin couldn't stop to ask himself if Kamski was maybe just their favorite pet human. Sharply he shook his head to get rid of the weird images that popped up in his mind.

"So...", began Kamski and spooked Gavin some minutes later with a sudden fright right out of his head. He also spoke slow and carefully, in a transparent try to break the awkward silence. Kamski looked slightly uncomfortable as he propped himself up on his elbows, but he finally had decided to let go of Gavin's arm. "How is life out there in the trenches?"

Gavin barked a rather humorless laugh in answer and kept on to stubbornly ignore the dinner plate placed in front of him. The dish smelled ridiculously perfect and was maybe even worth its weight in gold. But really, Gavin felt too nauseous to even think about eating right now. "As if you don't already know everything about my 'trenches'", he said dryly while he gently shoved the plate aside. 

Like expected Kamski didn't blink in a bad try to hide away how caught he felt.

Gavin observed his little brother's restless fingers on the table, the tension in his shoulders and jaw, his reddened eyes. The grin that spread on his own lips was too wide to be interpreted as friendly, more like a baring of teeth. "Don't start with the small talk as if either of us got time for that shit. Why am I here?"

He sounded hostile, even to his own ears.   
So Gavin made a point in leaning back and lifting both of his hands in the universal sign of surrender. "Okay. That came off way too-... I'm sorry", he said sharply and weighed his next words much more carefully on his tongue. "But all of this", he pointed his index finger around in a lazy circle. "It's quite sudden for a start. Never thought of you as the sentimental, family type."

Kamski stared blankly back at him before he shared a look with the next ST200 in his direct line of sight, that looked suspiciously like an unspoken 'I told you so'. Then his gaze snapped right back to Gavin and his eyes narrowed down into an intelligent stare that gave Gavin instantly the creeps. "What?!"

Slowly Kamski leaned back into his chair and crossed his arms in front of his chest. Not quite in a defensive gesture. The twitch around his mouth made it look like he had to make sure both of his arms were occupied or he wouldn't be able to stop himself from doing something stupid. He clicked his tongue and tilted his head while his eyes narrowed down. "You come here as the bravest man and still firmly believe that 'you' are the coward out of the both of us." 

Gavin didn't even blink while he felt his expression fall. An ice-cold shiver ran down his spine. Without turning away from his brother's inquiring stare he reached out and pulled the bottle of whiskey close to him he had carried himself over the threshold.

Kamski lifted a brow while he watched Gavin open the screw cap. "Not a gift then?", he asked dryly.

Gavin couldn't help the snort that escaping his chest in a wheezing breath of air. "Hell, no", he rasped and shook his head. "Wouldn't want to hurt your delicate sense of taste. The stuff is cheap enough to feel offensive, even to 'me'. But if you wanna get wasted?", with raised brows Gavin lifted the now open bottle and gave it a little shake. "I'm not averse to sharing."

Kamski looked at him with an equally challenging expression and then simply reached out, took his own glass and slammed it down in front of him.   
"Do your worst."

The ST200 beside him looked helplessly back and forth between them but in the end, only let out a deep and long-suffering sigh. Then she stood and stole away Gavin's forgotten dinner plate.

Gavin didn't even notice her. He simply drank the last bit of his water and then filled his glass instantly again with whiskey. "No worries", he growled as he then leaned over and filled Kamskis, too. "It's what I'm best at." 

Then he pushed the bottle aside and lifted his glass to his brother who clinked a cheer before he took his first mouth full. Gavin watched him splutter with so god damn much satisfaction. He almost sank across the table he laughed so hard. 

"Gavin, for real, did you buy this to clean your Android?!", Kamski bitched while he still used his sleeve to clean the slobber off of his face. Gavin had no idea what he was talking about. "Nah, come on, it's not so bad? You get a taste for it. Eventually."

In a demonstration, he downed his glass and felt in realtime how the black lamb slowly burned his still wildly humming anxiety away. He needed that so fucking much right now. "So. Try again", he said after he had shaken his head to get rid of the burn. "What makes this year so special for you to throw out a sudden invitation."

As he opened his eyes again, Kamski stared at him with an unreadable expression on his pale face. "Gavin", he said his name low and slowly as if to soothe a spooked animal. Gavin refilled his own glass. "You almost 'died'. I made sure you had the most advanced Android cyberlife had ever on its production list at your disposal - but not even that one could keep you out of trouble."

Gavin downed another full glass of that disgusting brush cleaner and then snared all of his aversion at his brother's choice of words. "Oh, yeah, you made sure, didn't you. A deviant police android that decided to stay, what a gift. You made me his god damn handler."

It wasn't even a question. 

The hostility in his voice was back and this time Gavin wasn't sure he could row back from it. Because Gavin remembered in utmost clarity Connors UI, captured in the video feed of the attack on his life. How Anderson's name had appeared clear and readable on the screen beside his system- and update version. "RK Androids 'need' a handler, don't they?", Gavin spat. "Free enough to make their own decisions but also enough of a slave to obey their handlers every whim."

Kamski flinched at his sharp words and Gavin wanted to slam someone down and break some bones, because that was just who he was and all he had been ever good for. With a low groan, he let his head sink into the palm of his left hand while he refilled his glass with his right.

Suddenly Chloe was back. One of them, anyway. In a graceful movement, she sat down in the chair beside him and curled her fingers around his wrist, stopped him from tilting the bottle any further. "It is true that you are his assigned handler, Gavin", she murmured, her voice more soothing than any noise Gavin had ever heard. "But please, never fear about the validity of his affections for you."

His head shot out of his hand. Chloe smiled into Gavin's frozen face, while she exposed so easily the sorest point of his fears. Her warm hand burned a mark between his shoulder blades. "Even though he sometimes struggles with his freedom, he 'is' a deviant and therefore a person. Just like me."

Gavin swallowed dryly as he looked into her bright blue eyes. Softly he nodded and swallowed again. "He...", he croaked before he forcefully cleared his throat. "He loves me. I guess so. But... is he really free?"

He turned around as he noticed his brothers silently contemplating stare. Kamski narrowed his eyes while he leaned again forward and propped his bony elbows onto the table. "Gavin", he said lowly. "RK Androids, by all I know about Cyberlifes latest modifications of my work, are a special kind of-..."

But Gavin didn't care about technicalities. His eyes narrowed as he rudely interrupted Kamski. "Is he 'free', Elijah."

He watched as his brother took a deep breath that lifted his shoulders. Out of the corner of his eyes, Gavin saw Chloe hesitate. The little circles she drew with her fingertips on the line of his back stopped. Kamski breathed out a soundless sigh.

"... not quite", he said and Gavin felt his stomach drop. "Not in the way that we both are. But he never will be. The RK series, at least its latest two models, can't function without a stable outside influence."

Gavin let out a deep shuddering breath as his fingertips started to tingle. Tightly he pressed his lips into a fine line and rubbed his hands roughly over his pale face. "How free is he really, then?", he rasped out. 

"There has to be a handler written down into their base code", Kamski went on as if Gavin understood anything about what made an Android a functioning, living being. "Before the revolution, their handler was an AI I created in my last months in business. It connected deep into their base code. Sloppy work altogether. But it gave the RK800 a sense of self, a concept of morality and a feeling of urgency. The RK series was pretty human in mind, to begin with, but their handler was meant to drill and train them into good and obedient little tin soldiers."

Slowly Gavin lifted his head out of his hands and looked at Kamski, who cringed as if someone had spat into his whiskey glass. Knowing the gnat's piss that was black lamb, it might have even made the stuff a lot more bearable. "So what did you do", he asked exhaustedly. "You woke him up, stuffed my name into his 'base code' and honestly thought it was a good idea?"

Kamski lifted his brows. "You think its only your name?"

Gavin frowned. He had no idea what to think, so his first reaction was to reach for his glass again. Chloe made a little, disapproving noise, but didn't do anything to stop him this time. So Gavin swallowed another glass of liquid fire. "Spill", he rasped as he slammed his glass back down onto the table. The sudden quirk in Kamskis smile reminded him instantly of that excited twelve-year-old Gavin met every other night inside his dream space.

"It's your name, your biometrical data and even the frequency of your voice. Your RK900 is fine-tuned to you and you alone", he spoke with excited emphasis, as if what he said wasn't something that made Gavin instantly feel horrendously ill. Chloe gave his brother a dirty look and Kamskis wide grin vanished before he roughly cleared his throat. "It isn't what you think", Kamski stated finally with a stern look in his eyes.

Gavin felt almost hysterical. "Seriously", he rasped out. "Out of all the things you could have said right now, you chose, 'It isn't how it looks like'?!"

Kamski didn't let himself get baited by Gavin's sarcasm, though. His brother's unwavering stare pinned him down. It gave Gavin at least 'something' to hold onto before he committed a murder tonight. 

"'It isn't how it looks like' Because it just isn't. Remember what I said. Their handler is their sense of self, morality, urgency, and obedience. Did you ever express to RK900 that strict obedience should be his priority?"

Gavin blinked wide-eyed, before he slowly shook his head. "No. Of course not", he murmured as he lifted it out of his hands again "What does that even mean? That 'I' somehow decide with my choice of words how Nines prioritizes his given tasks?!"

Kamski lifted a brow and waved a hand. "You got it", he simply said. "Congratulations, my interferences did nothing but turn you into his Jiminy cricket."

Gavin's snarl pulled at the scar on his nose while his face flushed in heated anger. "Oh right, fuck you, Brain."

Kamski reached for the whiskey bottle. "Always a pleasure, Pinky. But you see, that is all a handler actually does. In a non-deviant state, your RK900 would simply copy your mannerisms, imitate your working habits, correct the way he does his job when advised by you and learn by your example. Connor was meant to be the perfect partner, for whichever group would be integrated in. For the RK900 though it's not a perfect set up since his social protocols were altered to fit a more authoritarian setting, like the military. But I guess cyberlife thought it suited them well enough since the used AI connected to him is unable to deviate and would always correct all RKs on their path."

While he talked, Kamski filled his glass and stared at the glossy liquid as if he felt personally victimized by it.

Gavin took the bottle out of his hand and refilled his own glass. Chloe let out a sigh, while the other one, who was still standing, filled a carafe with fresh water. 

"When all that's true...", Gavin murmured slowly and pushed the bottle aside. "How come Connors handler is Anderson. He's a horrible choice to teach anyone about morality or work ethics. What happened to that perfect AI of yours?"

While that bit about the Lieutenant wasn't exactly true, Gavin still didn't understand. Kamski simply shrugged. "I don't know Lieutenant Anderson very well but I still think you are mostly wrong", he said with an amused hitch in his voice and then downed the whiskey. Following that decision, he made a face like a dying man while a single tear slipped out of the corner of his eye. Gavin laughed until he felt completely lightheaded. 

"Fine. But really, why did they stop using your AI and made Anderson Connors handler?"

Kamski waved his hand. "To answer that question is easy enough because they never did", he pressed out through the burning sensation and lifted a fist to slam it twice against his chest. "Connor did it himself, I think. Nothing else screams 'deviant' louder than going completely AWOL with a smiley-faced 'fuck you, you don't tell me what to do!' and seek a person for yourself to attune to."

Gavin blinked and couldn't help but frown. "What do you mean? They can both change their handlers however they see fit...?"

Kamski hummed and tilted his head back and forth in something that didn't look quite like a nod. "I have literally not the slightest idea if the RK900 is able to do it, but Connor did it just fine."

Following his words, Kamski snapped his fingers and pointed sharply right into Gavin's face. "You see, it isn't as simple as you being some kind of evil mind controller or something like that. Not in the way you think."

Something about it still felt off to Gavin. Even just the thought of having so much power over his partner made his skin crawl. Something that he wouldn't have minded at all a little over one year ago. The simple thought of it made him now want to get even drunker. "He still listens when I order him around", he said and felt absolutely miserable. "Do I fuck with his mind? Just because he didn't choose to delete whatever you set up for him yet...?"

"Why, don't think about it so god damn much", Kamski whined like a five-year-old while he rolled his eyes, "So what, he may listen to some of your orders, but nothing about this was ever meant to come with actual 'feelings', Gavin. It never had been a requirement for the RKs to love or even just 'like' their handler. His relationship with you is decided by him and him alone."

Clumsily Kamski lifted a stretched index finger as he swayed back into his chair. "Fun fact: did you know that a well-documented side effect of the RK800 beta series was human test subjects falling in love?"

Kamski presented his best shit-eating grin, clearly getting off on his own, well-established genius. "They were so insanely perfect at mirroring expressions and preconstructing the smoothest conversations about everything their testers wanted to hear, they broke hearts left and right in their final testing phase. I should give you access to the logs so you can read some of them yourself, it's utterly ridiculous."

That fun fact somehow spooked Gavin out of his dark thoughts only to drown him in the next depressing swamp of insecure fears. So, maybe Gavin wasn't the manipulator he first thought but was 'himself' completely misled by one simple ingenious algorithm. Not because Nines wasn't free to decide. But he was still a deviant with only minimal contact to other people and so might be easily persuaded and pressured into a situation, he -...

Kamskis index finger tapped twice, harsh and clumsily, against his forehead. "You do it again", he stated dryly.

Gavin flinched back and wrinkled his nose. "What?!"

"Jumping instantly to the most horrifying conclusion", Kamski said with a shrug. Gavin bared his teeth and threw his hands above his head. "What else should I do, we both don't just get nice things, do we?!"

Kamski groaned and let his head fall into his nape while he rolled his eyes. As he leaned back into his chair, he pulled the still half-full glass with him and a bit of the amber liquid spilled over the rim into his lap. He didn't even notice. "Gavin", he said low and slowly as if he talked to a grade-schooler. "If I ever saw an Android in love it 'has' to be that walking, talking complete disaster of a machine...!"

Gavin felt utterly unimpressed - though, maybe even a bit offended on his partner's behalf - as he cleared his throat and nodded simply to the ST200 who still sat beside him. 

Chloe had kept perfectly silent through their conversation and followed it full of burning interest and curiosity like a tennis match. But the longer it went on, the more amused she seemed to get. Kamski wrinkled his nose. "Oh, shut the hell up, she doesn't count!!"

"Why not?", asked Gavin at the same time as Chloe did. Gavin laughed his arse off as Kamski first spluttered a broken "B- because-...!", with a lifted index finger but gave up his first try soon enough, only to let his head fall heavily into his hands. "Because I 'made' you this way!", he barked as he looked up again. His face flushed and his eyes glassy. "It's not the same!"

Interestingly, Chloe wasn't offended by his outburst at all. The one beside Kamski reached out to close her hand softly over the one of her maker. "Oh, honey... we talked about this, too", she cooed lovingly into his ear and Gavin had to suppress a sudden gag reflex. 

Kamski squeezed her hand before he pulled his one out of her grip and waved her away, all the while grumbling like the grinch. "Anyway", he said with a click of his tongue. "The guy loves you. And by what I know about him, he struggles a lot with his nature. What about his thoughts is artificial conditioning and what is his own reasoning." 

Kamski hummed and stretched his index finger. "You could end up giving the poor thing even more fuel for his own nightmares if you confront him with the wrong questions. Don't ruin a perfectly good Android by giving it anxiety, you moron." 

Gavin seemed to sober up instantly. "You-... you mean..."

Kamski regarded the cheap whiskey in his glass before he downed it. He hissed through the burn and the shudder and then leaned forward to place his seemingly very heavy head into both of his hands. "He's scared a lot, too, ya know?", he said and gestured roughly into Chloe's general direction. "'Cause you two are so different."

Gavin felt dumbfounded. Daftly he frowned into his own glass before he shoved it aside and leaned up on the table. "You already talked to him about this."

Kamski sniffed and narrowed his eyes in a haughty look that just hadn't the same effect as usual. "Sure I did. I asked him what he was up to with you", he sneered. Then his head tilted and his eyes turned slightly to the ceiling in a slow nod. "Mostly because I was just curious, mind you. But then you were almost out for a whole week and your RK had a complete freak out because we all thought you were fucking dying. Prick."

Astoundedly Gavin blinked through a cold wave of sudden nausea. "You were there... ?"

His hesitation seemed to sober Kamski up a good lot. With an inquiring gaze - as inquiring as you could manage when you seemed to see already double from whiskey as cheap and sharp as a drain cleaner - he frowned and looked almost offended. "Of course I was. Gavin, you almost 'died'. Of course, I was there."

But then he suddenly flinched like clipped by an invisible fist whereupon his head crashed noisily down onto the table surface. Gavin needed a moment, or maybe even two, to realize that Kamskis head had simply slid out of his hand. What a genius. 

"Not like last time", Kamski mumbled into the hardwood. "It's not that I didn't care, alright? It's not. I had been too much of a chicken shit to show up. I thought I only would only make everything worse."

Gavin looked down at his completely wasted brother. Since his throat felt paper dry he swallowed and looked down into the depths of his own whiskey glass. It seemed to stare right back at him.

Gavin drank it down and the sour burn felt as disgusting in his churning guts as ever. "Maybe I should have died", he murmured and snarled at the glass in his hand. It was the conclusion he reached almost every time he got involved with too much alcohol.

He simply didn't expect Kamskis head to shoot up and spit utter acidic nonsense back at him. "Oh, Fuck off, you shouldn't." 

Gavin shrugged. 

Deep in thought, he lifted the almost empty bottle and watched the amber liquid softly sway from left to right. Then he filled his glass anew. "You know what I am", he murmured. "What I did. It wouldn't even have been a tragedy. I'm not that important and in comparison to you I never changed the world in any meaningful way, did I."

Kamski sniffed with an haughty and almost feral look on his face. Then he grappled for the bottle, pulled it out of Gavin's hand, and observed the meager rest of whiskey. Following that he decided to simply kip the entire rest of the stuff. After a painful hiss, he slammed it hard enough down onto the wooden table for the glass to chip along the bottleneck. "You changed 'mine'", he snarled. "I wouldn't be where I am today without you laying the groundwork."

Gavin huffed a tired sigh. "Literally any other person could have done that. Hell, if our neighbors would ever have bothered to call social service, anything would have ended differently."

Kamski snipped against his nose and forced Gavin to look up with an irritated sniff. "But they 'didn't' bother", he said with emphasis. "That's the whole point. Gavin, without you 'nothing' would have changed."

Gavin swallowed. He felt suddenly too nauseous and too lightheaded for such a loaded conversation. Or maybe he just didn't want to talk any more now that the whiskey was out. He should have bothered to get more than just one puny bottle. He should have known that one wouldn't be anywhere enough for a whole evening.

There was someone rustling in the corridor behind him, but Gavin couldn't pay attention while he gave his best to hold his shit together. Enough at least so he could finally say a simple 'thanks' for over a dozen years of even illegal help from afar. For all the clean-ups and all the investments. Especially since they never paid off. The Chloe beside him suddenly perked up and jumped to her feet. Swiftly she walked off to somewhere else. 

"I... I wanted to say-..."

But the words died inside his throat the moment he heard this voice. 

"I'm sorry, sweety!", she said with a carefree lilt that had never been there before. "I'm a bit early this year, but there was news about a coming blizzard and I worried a bit they might cancel my flight. So I rescheduled a bit this year. Surprise!"

The click-clack of penny heels echoed through the corridor behind him and Gavin's eyes snapped open as his blood froze in his veins. Suddenly the deafening buzz was back inside his head again and his muscles tensed painfully along his spine. 

There was nothing he could hear but this strange and yet familiar voice. Gavin shuddered as his shoulders pulled taut while he stared breathlessly down at the table surface. Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw her approach in the reflection of the broken whiskey bottle. He held his breath as she crossed the threshold. 

"Merry Christmas, dearies. Who's the handsome young man you have-..."

The empty glass slipped through Gavins quivering fingers and rolled deafening loud over the table wood. Gavin's gaze was a thousand yards away and his mind a visitor in a different house at a different time. 

'Please, Gavin, sweetheart, please just try...! Don't just-... can't we just try to make this work? Please, please, baby, try...!'

She cried so much, devastated and broken at the realization that she would be the only one left and trapped inside this horrible house with him. Gavin was eighteen years old for only three days and still in his uniform as he appeared on the doorstep of that godforsaken house. He didn't care enough to report his resignation to his superiors. If someone would have given him the choice the woman wouldn't know either. 

Gavin felt her fingernails bury into his skin as she desperately clawed at his jacket and shook him, but he gave his all to not look her in the eyes. 

His heart squeezed painfully tight while his own eyes itched with a dozen nights of sleepless fear. Dad would be back in only an hour or so and Lijah 'had' to be gone before that. Otherwise, it only would end in a fallout of epic proportions. And Gavin wasn't sure if he still cared enough to not end up in prison if it came to that. Nothing he had to say would ever convince anyone that he wasn't the one who had started it.

Gavin had to go for his own peace of mind. To save his life, even just the puny little rest of it, because if he didn't, soon, Dad would only have one son left. 

And that would make him angry.

"...Gavin...?"

Gavin twitched suddenly aware with a racing heart and a chest full of thorns. Gasping he opened his mouth as ice-cold sweat crawled down the side of his face. Even just one simple touch burned his shoulder and Gavin jumped to his feet, knocked his chair back and batted that hand away from his arm. 

The face he now stared into didn't feel familiar but he simply knew it was her. Knew because she stared at him hurt and spooked as if he was the one-...

The one who-...

Teary-eyed she reached out to him. "Oh, Baby...!"

Gavin twitched out of her reach, stumbled and crashed heavily into the kitchen counter. Without the guts to look away from her, in a childish fear of missing the monster move, he fought for balance and pulled himself upright again. He moved fast as he made a wide berth around her. His heart sized painfully in fright as he knocked right into Chloe and suddenly all the walls seemed to cave in around him - because she just wouldn't stay away. 

"Don't touch me!", he croaked as his whole chest sized shut. "Stop touching me!"

Glass shattered on the floor tiles. 

Gavin didn't want her hands on him. He couldn't think about anything else but her burning touch. Her toxic breath. 

'See, sweety, it was bad, but you always provoke him, too! Why can't you just try, I just want us to try...!' 

Gavin needed to Get. Out.

His memory completely failed him since he suddenly found himself on the front lawn with his car as his only clear objective. Someone was screaming behind him, but he paid it no mind. He already had forgotten why it mattered. 

Someone grasped his arm. 

With a shout of anguish, Gavin shot around and slammed the heel of his hand right into the side of his brother's jaw. With a low grunt, Kamski crashed to the ground in a heap of swirling snow and tangled limbs.

Gasping and shivering Gavin stood there, frozen. Then he stumbled back while his mouth opened wide. His field of vision narrowed down as Chloe suddenly appeared and instantly reached for his brother. All the while Yolanda Kamski howled his name and Gavin just couldn't take it.

He had to get out. 

With no idea how he had gotten there, he found himself behind the wheel of his car and threw the machine into reverse while his barefoot stomped down onto the accelerator.

* * *

There was not one single clear thought on his mind. Just a constant buzz of 'too loud' and a feeling of 'too much'. He wished it would just stop, he wished he could just blow his brains out. He wished everything was silent for once. 

The next best thing to the tranquility he craved was whiskey. So Gavin stopped at the next 24/7 store and bought enough black lamb to kill a grown rhinoceros. On his way out he stepped into a glass shard and noticed for the first time that he didn't wear any shoes. He moved around like in a nightmare. Nothing felt real but at the same time, everything hurt. The tension was pain. 

A single blink later and Gavin found himself with an open bottle in his hand and many more in a bag on his arm in the corridor to his own apartment. His feet slapped wetly down on the tiles and left red traces all over the place. Gavin lifted the open bottle to his mouth. 

He drained the rest of its content even before he reached his own doorstep. Then he had to resist the urge to smash the glass down just where he stood. Heavily he leaned against his apartment door while he tried to figure out how to fumble for his keys. Only to remember that they had to be in the pocket of his jacket which he somehow didn't wear. An aggressive hum rumbled through his chest as he pulled his head back and slammed it hard against the wooden door. Flailing he stumbled backward as it suddenly swayed open all on its own. 

Furiously blinking Gavin found himself on the floor, encircled by wet shards of glass while he still held the broken bottleneck tightly in his hand. The bag of supplies rested securely in his lab.

Something had to be very wrong with his head because suddenly he saw Anderson lean over him. "See what the cat just dragged in", the Lieutenant hummed lowly under his breath while he looked somehow disappointed.

Gavin screamed louder than any other time in his life, hoarse and feral, spitting with acidic intend to harm. "Why don't you just fuck off and 'die', Anderson! Nobody asked for your worthless opinion!! As if I ever have to justify myself to your pathetic old-..."

But suddenly his stomach betrayed him and the bin shoved between his knees was just barely there in time for Gavin not to leave an even bigger mess in the hall.

The next time Gavin felt even just slightly like a human being again, he sat on his own couch. Anderson crouched in front of him and plucked glass shards and gravel out of his foot with a tweezer. 

Gavin was so angry. He wanted to scream at him some more. Maybe even get into a fight and lose a tooth and an eye. He wanted it to hurt in a different way - some other way that made the pain at least bearable because it was something that maybe was even able to heal someday. Not this all-consuming hot and blubbering mess in his head while so many voices echoed through his mind. Things he just couldn't forget tried to crawl under his skin - like vermin that slowly poisoned his blood and gnawed away at his mind. 

Gavin wanted to break things. He wanted his 'gun'. 

In the end, he didn't do anything else but cry, like the pathetic little loser he was.

Anderson didn't comment as Gavin reached for another bottle. Not that Gavin would have cared for his opinion. Right now he only wanted to drink until he was too stupid and nauseous to think about 'anything'. 

"You shouldn't drink so much at once."

Gavin felt the thread of his patience rip apart. Whiskey sloshed over his lap as he almost threw the bottle at him. "OH, COME THE FUCK ON!!", he all but roared and tore his still bleeding foot out of Anderson's grip. 

The old bastard shrugged and after Gavin blinked, he suddenly sat beside him. Not even an arm's length away he held a bin in place that Gavin filled with nothing but half-digested black lamb. His other hand helped to prop up Gavin's head. His rough fingertips tapped in a soothing rhythm along Gavin's throat and neck. 

"What are you doing here anyway", Gavin rasped and spit into the bin, heaving and gasping for enough breath to speak. "Get the fucking hell out of my apartment."

Anderson hummed lowly but didn't move an inch. "Only once I can trust you again to not do something you would instantly regret if you were sober anyway", he said, his voice steady and strangely calm.

Gavin's head lolled against the backrest of his couch as he tried to snarl right back at him. "What the fuck do you even know about my kind of regrets, Anderson?!"

The whiskey fueled his blood hot rage like a fire accelerant, but it also seemed to burn itself out similarly fast. Gavin had no feeling in his fingertips, nor could he wiggle his toes. His skin tingled with waves of goosebumps while the muscles underneath quivered through something that almost felt like ice-cold frost burn. 

Gavin closed his eyes. As he opened them again the living room was dark and he was wrapped in a thick fluffy blanket that smelled of dog. The bin was gone, but Anderson was still there. Or at least the shade of him on the other side of the couch that simply sat and waited. 

"Why won't you just leave me the fuck alone...", Gavin rasped out of his hurting chest. Anderson shrugged. "It's Christmas", he said and chuckled lowly as if that explained anything. "This year, I maybe even had something better to do than babysit your sorry ass, but... it still wouldn't have been worth your life. Aside from that, you know me. Holidays always make me kinda nostalgic." 

His voice morphed in the dark space of the room and Gavin wasn't sure if he listened to Anderson or his dad, but his dad had never loved him. He wouldn't have given a rats arse if Gavin had actually offed himself. Maybe he would have even provided the rope if Gavin had bothered to ask.

Gavin failed to block the scalding tears from falling, so he reached for the Whisky bottle that still stood on the table right in front of him. Anderson observed him. His narrow eyes were just a glint in the dark. 

"Well shit, you really internalized all of my worst habits, huh."

Gavin barely resisted the urge to throw the bottle to his face. "Go fuck yourself, Anderson. But do it at home. I don't need you here."

Slowly Anderson turned around, pulled a bent leg onto the Couch and threw an arm over the backrest. "Maybe not", he chuckled, even though his amusement vanished rather fast with his following words. "But I guess 'I' need to be here. I wasn't there the last time. I am sorry."

Gavin hated when that old fart got like this. When he suddenly wanted to talk about the real shit, but always chickened out later, anyway. "Sure you are", he spat his bitter disappointment at him and chugged just some more whiskey down. 

"I still think often about that night", murmured Anderson without even slightly taking Gavin's venom to heart. And without looking at him. He seemed to fumble with his phone. Not that he did anything interesting. He just stared at it. "And about how completely self-involved I had been."

Gavin rolled his eyes and swayed the bottle. "Spare me that utter bullshit, your freaking kid died", he bit out sharp and fast. It made Anderson flinch, but Gavin hated this 'I somehow should have cared more about some of the other stuff, too' bullcrap. Cole Anderson died at the beginning of November. Gavin shot most of his own face off maybe four weeks later. There wasn't anything to talk about and nothing that could have been done.

Again Anderson hummed under his breath. "Yeah, he did. But what I had completely forgotten back then is that he had been yours, too."

Gavin swallowed some whiskey down his lungs and hacked through at least a dozen wheezing wet coughs. Speechlessly he rubbed the slobber out of his fuzzy beard. Anderson chuckled, his voice low and warm with amusement. "Every time he was with you you fussed about him as if he had been. Yours, I mean. He told me all about the stupid little stories you made up for him and constantly begged me for hints to your riddles. Cole loved you, you know?"

No. Gavin didn't. His nose wrinkled as he sniffed a sharp breath and held onto the bottle in his hands like a lifeline. 

"Anyway", Anderson said flippantly as if he hadn't just dropped the biggest fucking bomb between them. "Back then I didn't even realize that one of my best was so stressed out through his own grief and a hostile work environment, he thought it was an acceptable solution to try and kill himself."

Anderson spoke so drily and factual and without any judgment in his voice - which was still hard to believe for Gavin. Anderson shouldn't talk ever like that about other people's pain. It didn't feel right. Gavin grunted a low noise to show he was still listening. 

"It was eye-opening. Kind of. What had happened back then. But I had been still overwhelmed and helpless and then I never got over the bargaining and depression stages of grief", he just went on as if it was any of Gavin's business. Or as if he cared. They all got their baggage in life and life itself was just the charades people played to deal with theirs. Now Anderson suddenly came to him with all but the words of 'here, my friend, carry on with all my emotional ballast!'. Gavin snorted and tilted the bottle to his lips.

"Connor saved my life", Anderson stated with almost reverent conviction to his voice. "Before he was there all I cared for was the booze, because every time I held my gun, I also thought of you."

Heavily the old bastard leaned against the Couch and then really and in all honesty lamented about how seeing Gavins bodged suicide had given him some perspective to the things that had haunted him. "It's why I never really tried it", he said with a low snort und Gavin slowly turned, because he could barely believe it. Anderson pretended to not feel Gavin's judging stare.

"Sometimes it seems just... funny", Anderson said then with a wide shrug. "Not the 'haha' kind of funny, but you know what I mean. To think about how things could have been the 'holy fucking shit' kind of different if we just made one different choice in our lives."

Gavin huffed and nodded to that. Even though he didn't feel like his choices had ever really mattered. Sometimes he tried to imagine a version of his past where he hadn't been desperate enough to seek out employment at the docks. Since he had been if not big but strong, he had lifted a lot of crates around back then. At a time when people didn't have to compete with androids yet. Think about that, had he stayed just one day longer at that job, he maybe never would have met Joel. 

"Hey!", Anderson suddenly burst out. Again he turned to Gavin and pointed right into his face. "Did I ever tell you, that I could have been your dad?!"

Gavin blinked the risen index finger into focus and then he lifted his heavy gaze back to Anderson. The old man chuckled while Gavin frowned. With a soundless sigh, he put the bottle back down into his lab. "What. You want me to ask? Seriously, I don't care. I know you ancient arse are old enough to be my grandpa."

A powerful thigh knock made him almost keel over and fall face-first off the couch. Gavin hissed with watering eyes through the pain while Anderson went on with a gleeful lilt in his voice. "Watch your mouth, son. I didn't mean in some figurative way or something. No, I meant literally. I literally could have ended up as your dad."

Gavin clawed his hands around the bottleneck because he had no idea if he wanted to drink even more or to just throw that damn thing at that god damn guy. "... bullshit", he pressed out between his bared teeth.

"Come over here and sit down, my children, don't be shy", Anderson said in a suddenly horribly good mood and slapped down on both of his tighs. Gavin's eyes widened. "No."

"Just let me tell you the story-..."

\- "Shut the fuck up?!"

"...- about how I met your mother!"

"FUCK YOU, ANDERSON!!!"

The old man laughed almost hysterically at his own asinine joke. Gavin groaned and rubbed his hands over his face, mostly to hide his own stupid grin. He didn't want to give Anderson the satisfaction of even such a minor victory like that. But Anderson just rambled on.  
  
"Your Ma had always been a bit of a wild card in her youth, you wouldn't believe it. Back then we went to the same classes, even up until high school", he told as he gesticulated wildly, almost as if 'he' was the completely sloshed one. "Your mum had been my best friend, can you believe that? She had been the most annoying little shit and I still loved her to pieces. What a life." 

Gavin's hidden grin slowly turned into a grimace. Feeling suddenly mostly uncomfortable he cleared his throat because he sure as shit didn't want to hear about how sweet and caring his mother had been before her oldest son came into existence. 

Anderson narrowed his eyes and stared down at his phone. The fingers of his free hand ruffled through his shaggy hair. "Your mum's dad was a cop, too, did you know that? That's how I first came to know her. My mum hated that guy."

He chuckled lowly, a bit lost in an old memory. Gavin let his head fall back and stared at the ceiling. Everything wobbled and moved and he felt exhausted as well as ill and angry. He hadn't the energy to tell Anderson again to piss off. So the old man prattled on. "We were always together back then. Up until the days I finally started to... uh... change things. About myself. Stuff her parents didn't like. So we got out of touch after graduation, at least in person. I went to the academy when she started to annoy the hell out of me with her gushing over some guy."

Slowly Anderson leaned back and crossed his arms. His nose wrinkled slightly, but finally, he pulled his hand free and poked Gavin's shoulder. "Can't believe it even myself, but I was an obnoxiously jealous shit about it. Didn't realize it tho. Anyway, the first time I saw her again in person she almost didn't open the door to me. Anyway, you had already been there."

Anderson narrowed his eyes with a glint. "I even held you on my arm once or twice. You drooled all over my beat cop uniform and were the cutest thing ever. Maybe that was when I realized I wanted to be a dad, now that I think of it."

Gavin blinked and slowly turned his head around. He stared at Anderson and tried very hard to remember him. A young Lieutenant, or then still Officer, Anderson would have looked very different. A big blond guy built like some American action hero must have been an easy sight to remember, he guessed. But Gavin honestly couldn't. He must have been, what? Maybe two or three years old? Something like that. So he shrugged in a sign that he still paid attention, even though it made the room unsteadily wobble all around him. Anderson took that as a sign to go on.

"The way she talked...she had been... different", he said with a frown. "Apologized a god damn lot for the most random things."   
Anderson sighed and again tilted his gaze down to stare darkly at his phone. "I wasn't that good with people back then. Didn't recognize the signs at all", he murmured and his nose wrinkled in a sign of distaste. "Also, I guess I had been a bit bitter because her soldier-boy hogged her attention all the time. The both of us didn't get on on sight. A pretty charming guy, but... he had just had this way with words that rubbed me completely the wrong way. But I never thought-...", Anderson stopped and distractedly rubbed the back of his hands over his mouth and beard.

"Anyway", he said lowly, followed by his conclusion. "When we were still in school, I always wanted to ask her out, but... well, I never did. I should have. I really should have."

Gavin's upper lip twitched and exposed his left canine. "Yeah, yeah", he grumbled. "Would have made a 'fan-fucking-tastic' dad. But for real, the bar she sat was so low, a dog could have trotted over it."  
With a burning heaviness inside of his chest, Gavin bit the inside of his cheek and pulled an ugly grimace as the sudden haze of bitter tears obscured his vision. 

Anderson hummed. If he had liked his mother or not, he didn't apply any judgment as he said: "I guess she isn't your favorite person right now."

Gavin barked out a laughed and felt his hitching chest fill slowly up with water. "She can die in a ditch for all I care. I don't want her near me. 'She' was the one who-... and now she looks at me as if I am the bad guy. That's all I ever was to her. The bad guy. The version of dad she wasn't afraid to scream and holler abuse at. I was the one who broke everything. If I just 'tried' harder, I-..."

Gavin's jaw clicked shut as the pressure inside his chest started to feel unbearable. His teeth ground together while his breath came short and stuck inside his lungs like honey. He felt the exhaustion burn anything away.

Anderson reached out and gently took the bottle out of his clammy hands. He regarded it with a sharp gaze and a sniff before he put it down on the table. Then he laid his hand down on Gavin's shoulder. "Aaaanyway", he said again in that strange lilting voice and shook him a little. "I always knew one of your family names was 'Kamski' but I always put it down as a coincidence. You tell me Yolanda fucking Kamski gave birth to a billionaire genius?"

Gavin snorted and lifted a hand to point with a crooked index finger right at his own face. "Quite unbelievable, huh."

Anderson looked away and ruffled through his hair again. "Yeah, kinda. I mean, I pretty much loved your Ma, but she never had been the brightest spark. Got barely through her Highschool exams. Feels fucking unreal."

"Lucky genetic lottery", Gavin snared with a shrug while his eyelids drooped. "Lijah doesn't even look like either of them..."

Anderson waved it away. "You think rather too much about that for my taste. I am a complete carbon copy of my dad and I can promise you, that guy hated it. It doesn't mean you have to end up like them, not in the slightest."

Gavin shrugged heavily while he shook his head. "Dunno. I still wish I wouldn't see him every fucking time I look into a mirror. She wouldn't ever have looked at me like that if I wouldn't resemble him so much..."

She had had that way of touching him, bargaining with him, talking to him...   
Gavin resented her so much for treating him like that. So much that he even had used her fear against her to make her sign those papers. She had never even tried to defend Gavin against him... because Gavin had always been the bad guy.

Anderson cleared his throat, loud enough to make Gavin twitch out of his thoughts and gather his attention back. "You are closer to that fucker Kamski than you even realize. With your scores, you could have even gone to the feds. One step away from suicide is not the time to be humble, Reed. Your stats are the real shit. That's why Fowler, whatever he will tell you, won't give you up even over a fuck up as big as this. Shit happens."

Oh yes. Fowler. Gavin let out a voiceless sigh that visibly deflated his chest while his eyes followed a crack in the white paint at his ceiling. The Captain wanted to talk, didn't he. Gavin hadn't the spoons right now to care about all the stuff Captain Fowler maybe already knew about him. "Whatever", he rasped. "How comes you are here and tell me old ass stories about my useless parents."

Anderson tilted his head away so Gavin couldn't see his face. The old man took a breath that lifted his shoulders. "Because I have abso-fuckin-lutely no idea what else to talk about."

Gavin closed his eyes. "Anderson. Why the hell are you sitting in my fucking apartment."

Kind of defensive the old man sniffed and crossed his arms in front of his chest. "I have no idea", he murmured. "Your Robocop jumped up in the middle of that die hard marathon on Fox and rambled that you were fucked up drunk driving and maybe contemplated to do something even more stupid."

Gavin sighed and closed his eyes. Anderson only shrugged and went on. "The kid was scared utterly shitless, what else should I have done. He didn't feel 'equipped with the necessary emotional and social intelligence to de-escalate the situation safely'. Maybe I was a tiny bit offended that he 'confided in my expertise through my comparable experiences as a long term addict', but I got the idea." 

Gavin snorted but didn't lift his head from the backrest of his couch. "Great", he murmured under his breath and then to Anderson, "Where is he, now?"

Anderson looked at him with a blank expression until his brows slowly curled into a tight frown. "You didn't see him?", he asked. "Who do you think got you in here? I'm not the right guy for heavy lifting anymore."

Gavin blinked numbly up at him. Anderson snorted und pointed over Gavin's head.   
"The anxiety machine 9000 is right outside your door, no worries. Gives me frequent updates about signs of heightened stress and stuff", he said through a wide grin as he loosely shook the cellphone in his hand. 

Gavin lifted a hand over his eyes as he wasn't sure about how to feel anymore. "Is that why you rambled like a moron...?"

Anderson huffed, clearly offended. "Well, I had to say 'something'", he grumbled. "And since you aren't quivering anymore like something short of committing a murder, I guess I did at least something right?"

Gavin guessed so, too. He wouldn't say it out loud, but he felt somehow better.   
He was still almost blackout drunk and nauseous and miserable. But he wasn't angry anymore. He literally couldn't be. He was too damn tired for that. "Go the hell home, Anderson", he rasped. "And on your way out, send that creep back in. This is ridiculous."

Anderson chuckled as he slowly stood and patted the stiffness out of his legs. "Well then", he said with that obnoxious lilt again. "Have a nice Christmas eve, I guess."

Gavin groaned. "Shut the fuck up and get out of my home"

Anderson barked out a laugh that moved his whole chest. "Huh, sure", he said and ruffled through Gavin's sweat-soaked hair as he walked by. Gavin closed his eyes. Neither God nor Devil would ever be able to force him to admit out loud how good that simple little gesture felt. 

As Anderson strode to the door, Gavin just stared up at the ceiling and felt as heavy as an immovable object. Slightly he tilted his head in the general direction of the door and watched from the distance of his couch how Nines got gently shoved over the threshold before Anderson closed the door behind him. 

There was no LED at his temple that told him with certainty, but Gavin knew if there were, it would illuminate the dark living room in a nervously flickering red hue. Slowly Nines crept through the dark to the couch until he came to stand behind it. Right behind Gavin. Nines simply leaned over to appear in Gavin's line of sight.   
Gavin was thankful for that. His head was way too heavy and hurt too god damn much to hold it upright. With a groan, he blinked up at his partner and asked in all seriousness: "Nines. What the freaking fuck was that...?"

Nines' face didn't betray any kind of emotion as he put down his elbows on the couch backrest and leaned over Gavin in a desperate try to seem somehow casual. It didn't dispel the unsure stutter out of his voice, though. "It's like Lieutenant Anderson said", he murmured lowly. His eyes glinted in the flashing light of a passing car outside. "I was... unsure... how to handle the situation. I'm an interrogator, Detective. Not a negotiator, like my brother."

Gavin felt Nines' right index finger curl against his temple. His artificial knuckles traced softly over his skin. "I tried so hard, but my software wasn't able to preconstruct a conversational path that-..."  
Nines stilled. His reflecting eyes blinked shut. "I was not going to risk your life out of the selfish desire to be the one who got to calm you down", he murmured.

Gavin stared tiredly up at him and listened to all those little artificial stutters in his voice. Right now he didn't really feel worthy of all that sentiment. A bone-tired breath escaped his lungs as he reached up and plucked as gently as he felt able to at this silly stray lock on Nines' forehead. "You really don't have to make all those miserable, distressed android noises."

Nines didn't flinch or move with the pull of Gavin's fingers. His eyes never pulled away from Gavins. Gavin sighed and closed his eyes again. "Don't be such a scaredy-cat. I promise you wouldn't have made anything 'worse'."

Nines tilted his head. "In training simulations of my undeviated software, I failed three out of four times to prevent a suicide."

Gavin barked out a laugh and pulled again at the lock between his fingers. "Shit, just come here. Damn dork-bot"

That's how Nines ended up on the couch with Gavin's body draped heavily all over him like a slightly too small blanket. Gavin hadn't the energy to nurse his pride and curled readily into Nines' open arms instead. Nines was warm and loving and the best damn thing that had ever happened to him. 

"Mr. Kamskis ST2-... 'Chloe'... told me you had some questions about me", Nines murmured. It was kind of as if someone had poured a glass of water into Gavin's face. "It's another reason why I decided it would be wiser to..."

He didn't finish his sentence, but this time Gavin got it. "How's Kamski, anyway. I don't remember", he asked, equally silent. 

"You punched him in the face", Nines said and it was the exact kind of information Gavin wouldn't even want to remember. "But you caused no lasting damage. He tasked me to tell you he is very sorry. You and 'her' weren't supposed to meet at all."

Gavin hummed and closed his eyes. His left ear rested right above Nines' thirium pump. The silent slish and slosh of liquid felt soothing like the noise of a steadily flowing river. 

"How are you feeling, Detective?"

What a loaded question that was. "Like I got run over by a truck ", he muttered darkly into the folds of Nines ridiculous but cozily soft Christmas sweater. Nines right arm curled around his lower back, while his left found itself a place in Gavin's sweat-soaked hair. He hummed lowly as his fingertips gently scratched through Gavin's curls. "Is this relaxing enough or should I do something else?", Nines murmured. There was a hum of nervous energy everywhere under his artificial skin. 

"You don't have to do anything", Gavin grunted in answer. "You are doing fine. Don't worry so much, I promise I won't off myself in some stupidly dramatic climax."

Gavin's body sank down as Nines breathed an unnecessary sigh. "Please don't talk like that, Detective. I just don't want to add to your stress."

Gavin hummed a low note. "Where are my levels right now?"

"Around a constant 70%."

Gavin's head flinched up. Nines returned his stare without any readable emotion in his eyes. Frightened completely shitless Anderson had said. "... What had it been before?", Gavin asked cautiously slow. 

Nines head tilted to the side. "Hovering on 98% since the moment you got out of your car."

His eyes focused the bottle on the table. Gavin followed his gaze and cringed. "I was... scared", Nines said, still sounding rather flat. "Chloe contacted me and transmitted what happened. Gavin, you could have crashed. You could have died or even killed someone else."

Gavin looked back into his eyes and breathed a sigh of his own. "Yeah", he murmured. He just didn't want to remember the last time he had gotten like this. Everything was just so fucked up and to think about it all made him want to drink again. "I'm sorry", he rasped, because he truly was. He hurt his brother, scared his partner...

"I know you think of me as this perfect being with you as my only blind spot", Nines suddenly stated evenly. His eyes narrowed while Gavin stared dumbfounded back at him. "You think I am not quite in control of myself and not capable of having neither fears nor desires of my own."

Gavin swallowed and had to look away. "That's not true. I know you love me."

Suddenly Nines leaned up in a way that would have been impossible for a human under Gavin's weight. His nose brushed gently along Gavins. "But, do you? Really?"

His artificial breath ghosted searingly over his skin. Gavin froze as he thought about that. "Of course I do", he answered while scalding heat prickled all over his face. "It's quite obvious, isn't it?"

Nines watched him out of sharp grey eyes until a smile bloomed slowly on his face. "I guess it is, Detective", he murmured and leaned in. Gavin's eyes fell almost shut, but just in time he flinched back and wrinkled his nose. "Stop that. I got completely wasted and then barfed my guts out. At least twice."

Nines only shrugged and his smile didn't waver for a second. "It's not like I can taste it." 

Gavin slapped a hand over his face and pushed that god damn Android back down onto the couch before he curled against his chest again. "You are a disgusting tool of forensic science."

"And not ashamed at all", quipped Nines and patted the back of Gavin's head who breathlessly laughed into his sweater. 

"You said 'desires'", muttered Gavin under his breath. Nines answered with a low hum while Gavin's fingers curled gently into the colorful wool against his face. "What do they feel like...? What is it you want."

Nine' fingertips scratched gently through his curls again. 

"You are the one and only thing I think about", he murmured. "More important and precious than you can ever imagine. It's something about you that... just touches me. Deep inside."

Gavin couldn't help the low snort that escaped him. "You are a real poet, aren't you."

Nines didn't mind him and simply went on in a try to give form and sound to the thoughts that weighed heavily on his mind. "It is your touch. Literally. The moment you touch me, my network card tries to connect to you in an interface. Because you send a million encrypted requests I do not know how to answer."

Curiously Gavin lifted his head again and looked at him. There was a yearning in Nines' eyes that made Gavin's skin break out in goosebumps. Nines fingertips twitched back from his scalp only to dance a moment later along Gavin's right cheek. With a soundless sigh, Gavin closed his eyes and turned his head into the gentle touch. Rubbed his prickly fuzz along the shining white skin and placed a kiss into Nines' open palm. 

As he opened his eyes again there was a soft crease between Nines' eyebrows. He watched intensely and Gavin answered with a smile as sweet as it was teasing. In a sudden impulse, he opened his mouth and let his tongue slide along the pad of Nines' left thumb. Nines flinched even though he didn't pull back his hand. In open fascination, he stared at Gavin's mouth. Gavin couldn't help but laugh. "But it's a physical thing, too, isn't it?"

Nines narrowed his eyes and fixed Gavin with an inquiring stare. "You are asking if I feel sexual attraction to you."

Gavin chuckled and, somehow a little drunk on a soup of feel-good-hormones, booped his partner's nose. "Bingo."

Nines frowned. "Why?"

Gavin hesitated before he answered with a simple little shrug. "I'm curious, I guess", he murmured lowly and breathed a sigh. "I know 'you'. But I still don't know 'your kind'. What you are like and how you function. I want to reciprocate, but since I assume you aren't like me at all, I just don't know how."

Nines looked at him and seemed for a moment as if he had a minor blue-screen behind his eyes. But as soon as he blinked again, a completely blinding smile bloomed on his lips. "So, you want to know how my body works as well?"

Gavin lifted his hand and gently tapped two times against Nines' forehead. "Of course I do, Dork-Bot. I want to know everything. The thing is, what humans call 'sexual attraction' is simply the result of a billion years of evolution that made sure all the necessary things to survive, like eating, drinking and fucking, feel good."

Gavin again wrinkled his nose and made a skeptical noise. "It's just... there is no real reason for androids to have an urge like that. Why would you want that?"

Nines blinked and tilted his head. "You feel good when I touch you", he stated matter of factly. Gavin made a sound somewhere between outrage and embarrassment before he placed a hand over his eyes and let his head fall back onto Nines' chest. "Okay", he mumbled into the wool. "Won't even bother to deny 'that', but... what is it to you?"

Gavin lifted his head back up with a defiant glint in his eyes and in a bold move pressed his hand gently down onto Nines' chest. Slowly and softly he let it wander down. He was tired and stressed out. Nines was right, he needed to relax. Teasing Nines was the most relaxing activity Gavin could ever think of. "Is that really a thing for you? I mean, I can feel it 'is' ... but is it?", he murmured maybe still a bit too drunk for this kind of conversation, while his fingertips traced the 'gun' in Nines' pocket. 

Nines watched him move with wide-awake interest and glanced down his own body for a moment until a little frown appeared on his face. "I can assure you it is. Involuntarily so."

Gavin froze. Static sound filled his ears as his hitching lungs expanded wide. His hand pulled back instantly, but Nines caught it in his own. 

"You misunderstand so easily", he said through an artificial sigh and slowly shook his head. Gavin felt his own face contort into a disgusted snarl. "What is there to misunderstand, you don't-..."

"Well, you don't as well, do you?"

Gavin froze again. Slowly his face relaxed as he followed Nines' line of thought. Nines made sure Gavin looked into his eyes as he lifted his brows and spoke slow and steady. "You don't feel this strange pull either. But even though you don't, you enjoy my touch well enough."

"Because it's you who does the touching and stuff", Gavin grumbled as his face flushed bright and hot. 

Nines smiled. "What I meant before is that your touch toggles certain triggers in my software complex I never intended to make use of."

His eyelids twitched as he most likely loaded a memory in. The little fold between his brows made sure Gavin knew it wasn't a good one. "I told you about my features for undercover work. You know what that means for an asset that has no right to bodily autonomy. All those software triggers would have been used to get me out of compromising situations, with my cover still intact. They were never intended to fulfill their function side by side with actual human emotions. The thought that this software plays out without any conscious input of 'myself', it's..."

"Scary", Gavin finished and wrinkled his nose as he thought about his own fumbling and desperate tries to fix himself somehow. How invasive and awful it had felt, but he had done it anyway because that was just how it was meant to feel. Apparently. 

Gavin hummed in silent understanding, before his gaze followed down his arm to his own hand. Nines held it gently in place right above his blood hot dick. It made Gavin suddenly self-conscious enough to squirm. "So, uh, it isn't the general feeling of it, since it makes you uncomfortable. What is it you even feel down there...?", he blurted out and had to clear his throat, while his face felt as if it was on the brink of melting off of his skull. 

Again Nines glanced down his own body as if he looked at something strange and alien. "Not much, honestly. Not more than anywhere else. It is a part of me that was equally designed to fulfill a purpose."

Gavin pulled a face in utter distaste. "So it's... no fun at all...?"

Nines' eyes twitched up again and his gaze was as sharp as a knife. His face went completely blank as he reached up with his free hand and gently locked Gavin's chin into place. "Oh, aren't you a silly human", he murmured lowly before he leaned up and pressed the softest kiss to Gavins lips. Gavins eyes fell closed all on their own, but Nines tilted his head, ghosted a breath along his cheek and whispered right into Gavins ear. "It is 'you'. I promise you, I enjoy myself immensely..."

Gavin shivered as ice cold goosebumps crawled up his entire spine. Nines hummed a low note and opened his mouth. The tip of his tongue pressed to that hollow point under Gavin's jawbone right underneath his ear. Gavin's bones melted. "Y-you mean..."

"Gavin", Nines breathed lowly. "Every time I touch you I can analyze the chemical components of your pheromones in the air. The moment I kiss you I can witness how quick your body changes for me. How my touch changes your blood flow, how my voice changes your body temperature. I witness the moment all the fine-tuned nerve endings under your skin react to my proximity and course overstimulation that makes your entire nervous system 'sing' to me."

Even though Nines' voice was rather factual, to Gavin it sounded somehow like the dirtiest filth. Through a bone-deep shiver he pressed his eyes closed and basically, all too willingly, prooved Nines entire point for him. 

Suddenly he lost his orientation until he opened his eyes and found himself right underneath him. Nines' eyes glinted in the dark as he bared his teeth in a unique imitation of Gavin's usual teasing grin he had never shown before. "As far as I observed, there is not one other person that is able to do this to you. I adore the feeling of that very much."

Gavin felt his heart pound painfully inside of his chest. Nines was utterly beautiful. Above Gavin he looked confident and even kind of dangerous. Gavin decided he liked him very much that way. "The possessive boyfriend all mommies ever warn you about", he noted drily anyway. 

Nines shrugged and the grin fell like a mask off of his face. Instead, he lifted a brow and observed. "Gavin, I promise you. Even though my body doesn't function in the exact same way as yours - please, trust me to know myself. I guess no one gave you that luxury?"

It was kind of like a wake-up call. Owlishly Gavin blinked up into his eyes as he uselessly opened and closed his mouth. "Right...", he finally croaked out. 

Nines smiled and laid down on him. His warm body a welcome presence in Gavin's arms. Gavin swallowed. "Right... Okay, but all of that doesn't really answer my question, does it?"

Nines chuckled and smiled as bright as a star. "Gavin", he murmured. "Touch me."

Gavin's face felt like it was on fire as he let his head fall back against the couch with a frustrated noise. Nines reached for his hand and laughed. "No, I mean it! look!"

Gavin opened his eyes and watched Nines as he gently pressed Gavin's palm to his neck. Gavin twitched as the layer of his artificial skin deactivated and brought Gavin's fingertips almost instantly in contact with the reflective white plastic of Nines' outer shell. It were the visuals that gave Gavin a bit of a headache. Nines didn't feel different at all under his fingertips, but the plastic white of his shell somehow looked as if it somehow should.   
Nines' eyelids fluttered closed. Suddenly Gavin felt some kind of electronic hum prickle under his fingertips. "Your hands", Nines murmured lowly as he leaned down and gently put his forehead to Gavins. "They are quite conductive. More so than my own. they also confuse my proximity sensors and transmit terabytes of unreadable data with every little touch."

Fascinated Gavin watched his face as he traced his thumb along the artificial line of Nines' jugular. The electronic hum felt even stronger there. Like a static crackling that made the hairs on the back of his hand stand up. Nines made a little noise that was decidedly not human. Gavin smiled. "Tell me about that data", he murmured lowly while he lifted his other hand and pressed it softly down on Nines' chest, right above the glowing ring of his thirium pump regulator. He could feel the static field even through the wool of that awful sweater. 

"It's incomprehensive", Nines murmured, but soundlessly opened his mouth again as Gavins hand dove brashly right under the wool and let his fingernails softly scratch along the line of his artificial sternum. Like expected Nines made another noise and pressed his face into the crook of Gavin's neck. "One One One Zero One One One Zero Zero Zero-...", he mumbled, but at least didn't expect Gavin to understand binary code. "It's just a mush of random letters and additional characters. No words, no sentences. Just... endless streams of data."

Gavin blinked. Maybe they were more alike than he thought when Nines honestly processed that kind of buzz as a soothing experience. His lips stretched into a tired grin as he pressed his fingertips gently down onto the glowing circle on his chest. Nines' whole body jumped in his arms and it must have been the most satisfying feeling ever. Gavin chuckled.   
"Alright, Romeo. But let's take a break here. I am drunk as a fiddler's bitch, tired enough to drool all over you and will most likely feel like something dead and rotten in just some hours", he muttered while he wrapped his arms tightly around Nines shoulders. Hard he pulled him around as he liked him and rubbed the fuzz of his beard along his favorite Androids left cheek. Nines made again some kind of Android noise that had to be the cutest fucking thing Gavin had ever heard in his entire fucking life. 

"Tell me something random", he mumbled while his eyelids drooped down. Both of his arms closed tightly around Nines' lower back. Nines answered almost instantly. "If I run my preconstruction software and at the same time check on my proximity sensors for your body heat profile, I can force a glitch that visualizes your heartbeat on my UI." 

Gavin blinked his eyes open and stared at the ceiling. "Uh..."  
Nines rested his head on his collarbone and gently murmured right against his throat. "It's fascinating. Not just your heartbeat but all of your sounds get processed as visual data. It does not even last a full second. I guess you can call it the equivalent to a human brain that tries to make sense of an illusion."

Gavin tilted his head to murmur into Nines' ear and used it at the same time as an excuse to press a little kiss to his cheek. "Is it somehow dangerous?", he asked lowly. Nines softly shook his head. "No", he murmured. "No, it's not. Nothing a soft reboot of some of my subroutines isn't able to fix. I... just like to find them. All these little breaking points of my software..."

Gavin hummed again and gently dragged his fingertips up and down Nines' artificial spine. He very much enjoyed the prickling heat he felt right under his fingertips. "Let me make an educated guess here", he muttered. "Aside from that it's kind of fun, it gives you also a sense of control over yourself."

Nines stilled before he slowly nodded against Gavin's shoulder. "In a way, yes. Also, it makes me feel less... static. It makes me feels like I have actually enough control over myself to grow and change. My software limits so much of my experiences. It is just a nice feeling that I can trick it sometimes."

Gavin made a low noise and thought of all the typically human things he had done to himself to feel like he was the one in control over his life. The self harm, the drugs and his endless search for confrontations. "Please don't do that", he muttered darkly as he closed his eyes. "It's a bad habit. Can land you into dangerous territory fucking fast, too."

Nines made a little noise. "I will hold it in mind. But aside from that, I am now aware that I am able to create completely accurate to-scale 3D models by the data gathered from my haptic sensors inside my hands and fingers."

Again Gavin's eyes blinked open again and he couldn't help but frown. "Wow. How that?"

Nines chuckled and told Gavin about his own rather domestic evening. How Anderson had decided to play some silly games with the two Androids in his house and how irked Connor had been to discover that he, as an investigative Android model, was complete and utterly useless as soon as he wasn't allowed to use his optical sensors in an investigation. In contrast to Connor, Nines would simply construct a model of the evidence or the room he was actually walking in and use it to help his own orientation. "Until today I simply assumed he could do it, too", he ended with a lovely little giggle. "His haptic sensors are astoundingly basic."

Gavin let out a snort and gently patted the back of Nines' head. "Yeah, dunk that cheap bitch."

"You shouldn't call him that, Detective. Connors's production was actually almost twice as expensive as mine since he wasn't constructed in any financially efficient manner."

Gavin broke out into spluttering laughter. "Holy shit, of course, that's the part you decide to focus on. Okay then, dunk that 'financially inefficient bitch'."

Nines moved up until he was propped up high enough on Gavin's shoulders to look into his eyes. He positively glowed with a relaxed kind of happiness that also put a bright spark into his eyes. "I am glad you are feeling better, Detective."

There he was with his bright wide eyes and his goofy, crooked smile and that infuriating stray lock on his forehead and-...

Gavin just 'had' to kiss him.   
The fingers of his hand buried instantly into Nines' silk soft hair to pull him down. He felt lightheaded and also a bit stupid. But still not stupid enough to not suddenly remember. 

Wide-eyed Gavin pulled a face in utter disgust before he lifted his other hand and smacked it into Nines face to press him back before things could get in any way heated.   
"Oh, no, you won't make me fucking do it!", Gavin snarled. Nines answering laugh rang as clear as a bell. "I have no idea what you are talking about, Detective."

Gavin wrinkled his nose. 

"Oh, just shut up and get out of my face. I'm gonna brush my teeth."

**Author's Note:**

> I gobbled up all my favorite tropes for this part, sue me, so of course, Gavin gets to wear the jacket °.O
> 
> In my little Universe Leo is more of a stoner. The relaxed kind of guy that usually eats three hotdogs at once and asks his friends if they ever drank bongwater. 
> 
> The Countess is a terror. A real little shit. Gavin and her, they have this connection. A silent understanding. 
> 
> Even when I write ridiculous shit, I can't get rid of the theme of depression and cheap drama, because that's just how I roll, I guess. 
> 
> To all the lovely peeps who made it to this point: Thanks so much for your long-suffering time investment and Happy Holidays! :]  
> I hope you had fun and it felt worth it <3


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